Monthly Archives: October 2015

A State Auditor Looks into 5 School District Student Data Collection

The Missouri State Auditor is looking into data security, data breach, data retention policies in 5 school districts.

The review also included reviewing the state education agency data policies. The state agency will soon adopt policies related to data breaches.

MissouriNet | Missouri education department to change student data collection after audit

Student Data Security Regulatory Trend from State of Huckleberry Finn. 4 Things the Agency Will Do Differently.

Which state is getting on the student data security bandwagon? Missouri

What prompted regulatory action by the Missouri Department of Education? An Audit that found the department of education “unnecessarily collected and kept personal information from students”

What chages will occur at this education agency? 

  • Missouri will no longer colelct and store student social security numbers when they don’t need social security numbers
  • Missouri will destroy unneeded sensitive data from its…

Millions of Funding for Data Security for Electric Generation, Electric Grids & Oil & Gas.

  • Cyber Resilient Energy Delivery Consortium heads the $28.1 effort
  • Consists of 11 national laboratories and universities and is led by the University of Illinois
  • Dartmouth received a $925,000 grant to “improve the protection of the electric grid and oil and natural gas infrastructure from cyber threats”

Concord Monitor | AP | Dartmouth College gets $925K cybersecurity grant

Lege Trend: Student Data Security Bills in KeyStone State. 9 Prohibitions for Education Vendors.

Multiple bills dealing with protecting student data have been filed in the Pennsylvania legislature.

The bills include provision to set standards on education vendors for:

  • Prohibit tapping student information to target them with advertising;
  • Prohibit amassing profiles of students for non-educational purposes; 
  • Prohibit the sale or sharing of student information outside of narrow circumstances.
  • Require vendors to secure student data and delete it all upon the district’s…

Lege Trend: Model forms for Data Breach Notifications

California amended its data breach notification statutes this year to do 2 things:

1. Expand the definition of what type of information breach requires a notification for information gathered by an automatic license plate reader.

2. Provide a model form for entities that experience a data breach

National Law Review | California Amends Data Breach Notification Statute by Requiring Specific Notification Content and Expanding the Definition of Personal Information 

Drones & Data Storage. A Legislative Trend.

Drones collect data. Data everywhere. Private data. Public Data.

Legislatures and local governments are focused on …How long that data is stored, under what conditions, and under what dislcosure requirements is legislative fodder.

Are these private drones or public drones? Data release and data storage could apply to either. Here’s some of the legislative questions:

  • Are there penalties for a person’s private drone that collects data of someone’s orivate property?
  • How long can law…

City Creates CyberSecurity Squad. 5 Details to Build Your Own.

  • The local government creating the Cyber Security Squad: San Diego Regional Economic Development Corp
  • Why? The region is replete with defense and communications technology expertise
  • Goal of the Cyber Squad: “foster, enable and accelerate the cyber economy and to create an innovation hub for cyber here in the region”
  • Economic Boost from the Cyber Squad? Yes. Yes. Yes. 13 percent growth in the region for cyber, with over 100 companies, & 6,500 jobs. The economic growth rate of other…

Greater Houston Partnership Hosting Cybersecurity Forum. Link between strong cybersecurity & business.

Greater Houston Partnership for the upcoming Cybersecurity Forum: Protecting Your Business Online on Tuesday, October 13.

It’s part of the work of the Partnership’s Cybersecurity Task Force & stresses the import of cyber security to business. 

HAVE QUESTIONS?: Contact Amber Margraves at amargraves@houston.org or 713-844-3651.

Greater Houston Partnership Cybersecurity Forum

Sign of the Times: Warren Buffet Enters Data Security Insurance Market

This week Berkshire Hathaway Specialty Insurance division unvieled 2 new speciality policies:

  • Professional First Network Security & Privacy
  •  Professional First Professional Liability and Network Security & Privacy

What do the policies cover?

  • coverage for third-party exposures
  • resulting from data security and privacy breaches, breach expense and extortion threats, media liability and business interruption.

SC Magazine | Berkshire Hathaway Specialty Insurance enters cyberinsurance…