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SC CIO Office receives 2005 Council of State Governments (CSG) Innovations Award

Jim MacDougall, CIO's Director of Information Security Policy and Assessments, was presented the 2005 Innovations Award at the annual Innovations Award showcase in Delaware on Dec. 2, 2005.

The Division of the State Chief Information Officer's (CIO) South Carolina-Information Sharing and Analysis Center (SC-ISAC) received the 2005 Council of State Governments (CSG) Innovations Award on Aug. 2.

SC-ISAC was created in October 2003 in response to the lack of sufficient staff resources and security practices in place in South Carolina to defend against and minimize damage due to hostile attacks by viruses, worms and politically motivated or terrorist attacks.

The purpose of the SC-ISAC is, first, to assist members of the South Carolina government community in implementing proactive measures to reduce the risks of computer security incidents and, second, to assist that community in responding to such incidents when they occur. The specific operations of the program include:

* The South Carolina Information Sharing and Analysis Center (ISAC) to analyze and distribute information on security events, best practices and awareness programs to federal, state, county and local levels.
* A State Computer Security Incident Response Team (SC CSIRT) to create a trained resource (50 volunteers) that can be utilized by the State to minimize the impact and thereby the costs associated with a security event.
* A 24/7 Security Operations Center (SOC) to monitor and activate the CSIRT in the event of a security event. The centerpiece of the SOC will be a Security Information Management System (SIMS). By creating a central location for events to be recorded and monitored, the State will be the first with such a comprehensive view of the security posture of its network.

SC-ISAC is a unique partnership designed to enhance coordination of investigation and intelligence information to detect, pre-empt and prevent future cyber terrorist acts by combining resources, to include personnel, equipment and information from the CIO, the South Carolina Law Enforcement Division (SLED), the United States Secret Services (USSS), the Multi-State ISAC, the US-CERT and the Department of Homeland Security.

The approach uses the expert resources within each partner organization, leveraging what each does best. For example, SC-ISAC’s formed a partnership with the Computer Crime Center, SLED’s unit that fights cyber attacks against private companies. Until now, no organization was charged with defending public sector computers in South Carolina from malicious attacks.

CSG’s Innovations Awards are exclusively for state programs and is the only one in the country in which state officials select the winners. The award program ranks hundreds of nominees by how well states are reshaping state government resources and trend changes in public policy. Awarded in the “change driver” category of Privacy and Security, the award criteria was made based on newness, creativity, effectiveness, transferability and significance.

Trend changes that arise from demographic shifts, changes in political conditions, science and technological developments, economic dynamics and social and cultural shifts include:

* Aging
* Globalization
* Immigration
* Information dissemination
* Natural resource management
* New economy
* Polarization
* Population growth patterns
* Privacy and security
* Role in government

CSG’s national trends mission helps state officials address the near-and long-term by providing the critical foresight capabilities they need to make proactive policy decisions about issues that arise from trends.

CSG was founded in 1933 and is the premier organization in forecasting policy trends for state leaders – executive, legislative and judicial decision makers. For additional information, including descriptions of the 2005 award recipients, visit CSG’s Web site at www.csg.org (keyword: innovations).