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Government IT Admins Say Cyber Attacks Are Coming

by Terrence O'Brien on April 11, 2010 at 04:28 PM

Government IT Admins Say Cyber Attacks Are Coming
A new survey of government IT administrators reveals that almost three-quarters of them (74-percent, to be exact) expect the U.S. to be targeted by a foreign power in a cyber-attack this year. More alarmingly, 42-percent of those surveyed rated the government's ability to respond to or protect against such an attack as only "fair" or "poor."

The threats to our cybersecurity are seen as coming from all directions. Administrators are not just worried about increasingly sophisticated attacks from overseas. A full 49-percent were worried about internal weaknesses stemming from either negligence or purposely malicious actions from employees. A further 42-percent said they lacked the staff or funds to properly address these security concerns.

There is no denying, however, that the state of our cybersecurity apparatus has improved over the past year with the creation of new offices and cabinet positions dedicated to protecting our digital borders, and with highly publicized pushes to pull more talented computer engineers into government work. In fact, despite the primarily negative tone of the Federal Cyber Security Outlook for 2010 Survey, 47-percent of administrators rated the government's ability to handle an attack as "good."

It's obvious that there is plenty of room for improvement, but at least we know that the government isn't asleep on the job. [From: Lumension, via: Cnet]

Tags: cyberattack, CyberSecurity, cyberterrorism, government, security, survey, top

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