Cyberattack warnings can leave small local governments stressed and overwhelmed as they try to balance the need for increased cybersecurity and finding funds to pay for it. What you may not know is that help is available to your government at little to no cost, and you can get started today! We’ve identified three important steps you can take to defend your government against cybercrime.
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This weekend marks the start of daylight saving time, and we all know the drill: Change your clock and the batteries in your smoke alarms. But how often are you testing your government’s backup file system? With the rapid rise in phishing and ransomware schemes, the biannual time change can also serve as a handy reminder to perform this critical task.
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The State Auditor’s Office plays a unique role in keeping an independent eye on government IT security. We work with state and local governments to help improve their cybersecurity programs through audits and outreach activities. We’ve created a special report giving a short overview of our work and findings in the area of cybersecurity. It offers legislators, the public and government leaders information they need to help ensure our state’s critical IT systems and data remain protected.
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Automated Clearing House (ACH) frauds have been on the rise for a while, and we want to tell you some simple steps you can take to properly verify ACH and payroll bank account changes before making changes.
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If you’re a smaller government without your own full-time information technology staff, you might find it challenging to stay on top of IT-related maintenance. Larger entities have entire departments dedicated to maintaining computer infrastructure, while you may be working with a part-time contractor or even volunteers to meet your IT needs. And that’s okay, but remember: having the latest security software, web browser and operating system on your devices is an important defense against cyberattacks.
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Strengthening your government’s guard against the threats that compromised passwords pose is a necessary control for decreasing the risk of unauthorized users gaining access to your computers, network, or database. In this post, we explain how passwords get compromised and how multi-factor authentication (MFA) can help governments improve their account security to better protect their systems.
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It can be tempting to think it’s the experts’ job to keep us safe online. We trust our colleagues who are IT professionals and the technology services we use to stay up to date on the latest threats. But all of us, whether or not we are technology experts, have a part to play in cybersecurity. That’s why this year’s theme for October’s Cybersecurity Awareness Month is “Do your part, #BeCyberSmart.”
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This presentation tells the story of Washington’s Unemployment Insurance program during the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020, from the first American coronavirus patient diagnosed January 21 through the end of the year.
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Emergency federal unemployment programs launched early in the COVID-19 pandemic included provisions that opened state unemployment benefits to fraud, the Office of the Washington State Auditor found in three audits released today.
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The Office of the Washington State Auditor uses a third-party service provider, Accellion, to transmit data files in our audits. Accellion had a security incident in December, and announced it in January. On Monday, Feb. 1, Auditor Pat McCarthy announced that among other items, the information from 1.6 million unemployment claims might have been accessed by an unauthorized user. The investigation is ongoing.
Here are some questons and answers about this breach.
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