RICHMOND — Virginia state agencies essentially have a single, massive I.T. department, but with a switch to smaller, more flexible contracts recently recommended in a state report, lawmakers will have to figure out how to make the transition.
“There will be some changes. How we ultimately get to that solution is going to be a question,” Sen. Ryan McDougle says.
The report found that while the state has made gains under the current contract with Northrop Grumman, the state will be better off if it moves to smaller, more flexible deals after 2019 that can better adapt to changing agency needs, as well as fast-evolving technologies and threats.
“One of the other things that we continue to struggle with — and this is not just Virginia; it’s every state — is, as we have these systems in place … the security of the information, and it is a challenge,” McDougle says.
“We think about it from some of the larger organizations like DMV that has a lot of the information, but a lot of the attacks now are coming from directions like higher education because we get a lot of grant dollars; there are a lot of focus of research and development in those areas, so some other state-sponsored individuals would like to have access to that information,” he adds.
Since the state has its technology linked, the report recommends making sure that everything continues to work together, even as agencies try to split some systems off and adopt different technologies after the large, single contract expires.
“[It’s] a lot easier for them to attack a higher education institution than it is maybe a DoD or a Pentagon-based facility, so those create a lot of challenges as we go forward trying to deal with this unwinding,” McDougle says.
The University of Virginia shut down its email system this summer following a cyberattack that the university said originated in China.
While local governments and school systems use separate systems from those covered under the executive branch contract, experts have expressed concerns about their cybersecurity too.
