Federal Security Chiefs Take On Enhanced Strategic Role

Chief information security officers in federal government see their jobs becoming more policy-oriented, a new survey finds.

The survey, conducted by cybersecurity certification organization (ISC)2, consulting firm Garcia Strategies, and Cisco Systems, found that 55% of CISOs find their jobs gravitating more toward politics and policy. Only 26% see their jobs becoming more technical in nature.

"It's clear that federal CISOs understand that their roles are becoming more strategic," said David Graziano, operations director for security in Cisco's U.S. public sector group, in an interview. "There's better alignment with the idea of driving agency protection and with the agency CIOs on a policy level."

Though the survey didn't ask for reasons for this swing, it may be partly attributable to the growing scrutiny that Congress, the Obama administration, and the public have placed on government cybersecurity for at least the last year. Influencing factors include the release of numerous reports and bills and the appointment of new cybersecurity leadership in many parts of government, including a new cybersecurity coordinator in the White House.

More than half of CISOs, 56%, aren't satisfied with the way Congress has been handling cybersecurity issues.

CISOs seem to be more accepting of the Department of Homeland Security's Einstein intrusion detection and prevention system and strategy and the Internet gateway-consolidating Trusted Internet Connections initiative, both of which they characterized as frustrating in last year's survey.

One of the big issues in government cybersecurity circles is cloud computing. Almost 45% of federal CISOs surveyed express concern about their ability to replicate on-premise security policies in the cloud, and 21% cite concern over data loss prevention.

In terms of advice for new federal cybersecurity coordinator Howard Schmidt, appointed by the White House to oversee federal cybersecurity efforts, survey respondents ranked funding, shared security service implementation, and coordination with the private sector as top priorities.

Open government represents another challenge for CISOs. More than 74% say their agencies have data security policies in place to reconcile the need for both information transparency and protection, and 78% have Web 2.0 security policies in place.

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