The 2016 U.S. Government Cybersecurity Report, as researched and published by SecurityScorecard, places the U.S. Government’s Cybersecurity posture in last place compared to all other major industries, as reported by Reuters.
SecurityScorecard analyzed and graded the current security postures of 600 local, state, and federal government organizations, each with more than 1000 public-facing IP addresses, to determine the best and worst performers across all levels of U.S. Government. Read on…
U.S. Federal, state and local government agencies rank in last place in cybersecurity when compared against 17 major private industries, including transportation, retail and healthcare, according to a new report released Thursday.
The analysis, from venture-backed security risk bench-marking startup SecurityScorecard, measured the relative security health of government and industries across 10 categories, including vulnerability to malware infections, exposure rates of passwords and susceptibility to social engineering, such as an employee using corporate account information on a public social network.
Educations, telecommunications and pharmaceutical industries also ranked low, the report found. Information services, construction, food and technology were among the top performers.
Federal agencies scored most poorly on network security, software patching flaws and malware, according to SecurityScorecard, which said they may be more vulnerable to risk due to their large size.
(An analyst looks at code in the malware lab of a cyber security defense lab at the Idaho National Laboratory in Idaho Falls, Idaho September 29, 2011. REUTERS/Jim Urquhart)
Of the 600 government entities tracked, NASA performed the worst, the report found. The space exploration agency was vulnerable to email spoofing and malware intrusions, among other weaknesses, according to SecurityScorecard’s analysis.
Other low-performing government organizations included the U.S. Department of State and the information technology systems used by Connecticut, Pennsylvania, Washington and Maricopa County, Arizona.
The full report provides rankings and other detailed information, including specific score breakdowns of NASA, FBI, and the IRS, three major government organizations that fell victim to data breaches in early 2016.