From: Nextgov
By Aliya Sternstein
More government programs violated data security law standards in 2012 than in the previous year, the White House has informed Congress.
At the same time, computer security costs have increased by more than $1 billion, according to the executive branch’s yearly report on compliance with the 2002 Federal Information Security Management Act.
Inadequate training was a large part of the reason all-around FISMA adherence scores slipped from 75 percent in 2011 to 74 percent in 2012.
Agencies reported that about 88 percent of personnel with system access privileges received annual security awareness instruction, down from 99 percent in 2011. Meanwhile, personnel expenses accounted for the vast majority — 90 percent — of the $14.6 billion departments spent on information technology security in 2012. Agencies spent $1.3 billion less on IT security in 2011.
Other factors that led to lower FISMA marks in 2012 the major departments are not using smartcards to restrict network access and are not automatically configuring system settings. About 57 percent of user accounts require tokens to log on, down from 66 percent in 2011. A decrease in smartcard usage at the Pentagon and significantly lower usage at the Agriculture Department contributed to the decline.
The Defense Department also fell behind in automatically applying security configuration settings, dropping from 95 percent compliance in fiscal 2011 to 53 percent due to different reporting criteria this year.
Defense, along with the Homeland Security and Treasury departments, spent the most money on IT security, with expenditures totaling $12 billion, $615.5 million and $404 million respectively. Those figures include the cost of cybersecurity specialists, tools, testing and training.
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