| | DECEMBER 20218CIOReviewIN MY OPINIONEMERGENCY MANAGEMENT PARTNERSHIPS TO CREATE BETTER OUTCOMES IN CYBER INCIDENTSThe explosive growth in technologies related to the Internet of Things has enabled public safety and emergency management officials to leverage real time information for decisions, enabled earlier and more rapid alert and warnings to the public, allowed social and behavioral scientists to explore the intersections of demography and community resilience, and much more. These advances and the technologies driving them also create complexity, and any good emergency manager will tell you, increasing complexity means increasing vulnerability. The CIOs and CISOs implementing and protecting these systems shouldn't be doing so alone. As public safety and emergency management officials, we play a large part in supporting our CIOs and CISOs and have vested interest in their success. As advancements continue, there are key actions we can take to ensure strong partnerships. 1. Identify your cyber security vulnerabilities and develop a plan to mitigate impacts to operations and have a plan to regularly reassess for vulnerabilities and changes in your assumptions. Keeping up with the constant advancement of technologies and the ever-changing threat landscape is daunting. You don't have to go at it alone, and you surely don't have to create programs on your own. Earlier this year the Department of Homeland Security's Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) released a comprehensive catalog of services designed to help you know your risks, know your vulnerabilities, know your capabilities, and develop a plan of action. The interactive tool is available in PDF formatand includes offerings tailored for academia, industry and the private sector, non-profits, federal, state, local, territorial and tribal governments, and even the general public. The index includes hundreds of free services, tools and tool kits designed to get you started.Knowing the vulnerabilities allows you to create actionable contingency plans and ensure continuity of vital services should there ever be a disruption. Even if the plan of action is to move to pen and paper during a ransomware attack, having the pre-plan allows you to stay focused on the fight and not distracted by what could have been a preventable, secondary emergency with cascading impacts. By Aaron Miller, Director, Public Safety Communications and Emergency Management, Arlington County, VirginiaAaron Miller
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