Government

Cybersecurity threats are a growing concern for federal, state, and local governments.  The threat level is higher for local governments than for federal or state governments as they lack resources and funds.  Government systems store not only the data of those it serves but also of its employees such as social security numbers, tax records, voter records, and property tax information.  Because government must be transparent, it has made it easier for cybercriminals to exploit the system.  Ransomware attacks place critical data under ransom with the threat of deletion and may hinder critical services such as 911 call centers as was the case in October of 2016.  A 2016 survey done by the International City/County Management Association (ICMA) found that 70% of the respondents had not developed a formal cybersecurity plan and only 34% had written incident response plans.  It also found that 67% had experienced at least one cyberattack where their network security was compromised at least once a year while 44% of them said they experienced cyberattacks to their systems at least daily and the volume of attacks are increasing.  What is even more interesting is that 54% do not track how often their systems are attacked but these numbers may actually be higher than reported.  More alarming is the 27% of respondents who did not know how often they were attacked and experienced a breach (41%).   The ICMA survey also found that 52% of the respondents cited lack of funding as the main reason they were lacking in cybersecurity protection.