{"id":100897,"date":"2019-08-14T06:00:12","date_gmt":"2019-08-14T13:00:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.paloaltonetworks.com\/blog\/?p=100897"},"modified":"2019-08-13T21:38:30","modified_gmt":"2019-08-14T04:38:30","slug":"north-dakota-cybersecurity-vision","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/origin-researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com\/blog\/2019\/08\/north-dakota-cybersecurity-vision\/","title":{"rendered":"North Dakota\u2019s Big Cybersecurity Vision"},"content":{"rendered":"
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This piece was originally published August 6 on Security Roundtable<\/a>.<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

The people of North Dakota have a lot to be proud of. Our state is a leader in agriculture, energy and national defense. We\u2019re believers in humility and modesty\u2014strong Midwestern values that define how we go about our day at work, home and school.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

But there is one thing we feel so proud of that we hope you\u2019ll forgive us if we are uncharacteristically boastful: We intend to be the most connected state in America.<\/p>\n

Yes, in a country with such acknowledged technology-oriented states as California, New York, Texas and Massachusetts, we are positioning North Dakota to be a pioneer in the digital transformation of government, education, business, workforce and society.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

We are also planning to make cybersecurity the lingua franca of a digital North Dakota.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

These goals seem lofty \u2013 maybe even a stretch \u2013 for a state that has the second smallest population in the United States, is the most rural in the nation, and has an annual budget that would be little more than a rounding error compared to California or New York.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

But you don\u2019t need to be a colossus to be a leader. You do, however, need to be smart, resourceful, innovative and deeply dedicated to excellence in strategy, execution and communication.<\/p>\n

From the halls of the state capitol to every classroom, we\u2019re prioritizing cybersecurity as a state in order to protect our critical systems, safeguard the data of our citizens, train our next generation to succeed, and create the digital workforce of the 21st<\/sup>\u00a0century.\u00a0\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Every Student Cyber Educated\u00a0<\/span><\/b><\/h3>\n

To get to where we want to be, we\u2019re focused on comprehensive education in computer science. Our state\u2019s K-20W initiative is key to bringing together 40 different public- and private-sector entities to empower North Dakota\u2019s workforce, educators and students from kindergarten through PhD. That\u2019s why K-20W\u2019s mantra is: \u201cEvery student, every school, cyber-educated.\u201d<\/p>\n

We\u2019re establishing an overarching goal of training 700 teachers across the state on both computer science and cybersecurity, giving us at least one cyber-trained teacher for every 160 public school students. Every student graduating school today is entering a digital society.\u00a0\u00a0<\/span>Regardless of career path, nearly every job in the 21st<\/sup>\u00a0century uses computer technology.\u00a0\u00a0<\/span>It\u2019s time that every student learns the essential tools, as well as the risks and rewards.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Cyber education isn\u2019t just about unleashing the potential of machine learning and Internet of Things, it\u2019s also about driving cybersecurity awareness and action on all levels, attracting and retaining businesses to fuel economic growth. This is why we\u2019re giving parents, students, teachers and educational institutions the tools that they need to put cybersecurity front and center.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Whole of Government Cyber Defense<\/b><\/h3>\n

We formed a cybersecurity framework across the entire state\u2014unifying what had once been a patchwork of silos. We embraced the concept of \u201cwhole of government\u201d cyber defense, spanning all seven branches of public sector entities across the state: executive, legislative, judicial, higher education, K-12 education, cities and counties, helping to elevate our collective security posture for 252,000 statewide network users.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

We wanted to avoid the inefficiency and inevitable gaps created by implementing cybersecurity at only opportunistic, transactional levels by departments and entities. By committing ourselves to covering every aspect of North Dakota\u2019s public sector, we will become operationally more secure and make cybersecurity second nature to everything we do.<\/p>\n

A Proactive Mindset Toward Security<\/b><\/h3>\n

To embark on our statewide security transformation, we had to avoid the death trap of simply chasing every cybersecurity fire. We needed to shed the mindset of reacting to each breach, each zero-day attack, each ransomware and DDoS attack and treating them as one-off problems.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/span><\/div><\/p>\n

Instead, we needed to get out in front with a proactive plan to utilize technology, people and process as part of an active defense mindset. Techniques like threat hunting, network behavior analysis and other steps have allowed us to funnel out the noise to go far beyond reacting to known threats, and instead catch attacks before they happen. Core elements of our strategy include:\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Zero Trust:<\/b>\u00a0We committed to the\u00a0Zero Trust model of cybersecurity<\/a>\u00a0defense from the very start; in fact, we\u2019ve employed Zero Trust for more than 70% of our data centers. It\u2019s a big workload, but well worth it.<\/p>\n

IoT security:<\/b>\u00a0Having a big military and defense footprint in the state, as well as massive agricultural and energy sectors, means that North Dakota was an early adopter of the IoT. Think about the use of drone radar systems for Homeland Defense and other military applications, and the future need for a billion sensors to cover our farmlands and environmental ecosystems. You can\u2019t do the \u201cfarm of the future\u201d without IoT, and you can\u2019t do IoT without a specific plan to secure sensors, chip sets and other connected things.<\/p>\n

Cloud-first strategy:<\/b>\u00a0Obviously, it\u2019s not just small states like North Dakota that need the agility, flexibility and cost efficiency of the cloud. Every state, and every commercial entity, should move toward a cloud-first paradigm to encourage a nimbler approach to security.<\/p>\n

Lead by Action, and Courage\u00a0<\/span><\/b><\/h3>\n

Leadership requires many qualities, including courage, open communication, and creativity. Whether it\u2019s embracing new technologies or prioritizing cybersecurity, our approach has been: Why not? Or how can we do this? In fact, our new information technology vision is in the form of a question: How might we deliver world-class technology and services to our state?\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

We\u2019ve done a lot so far, including:\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

    \n
  • The state\u2019s Department of Public Instruction has teamed with state and industry experts to draft integrated computer science and cybersecurity standards\u2014making us the first state in the nation to emphasize cybersecurity in such an integral manner \u2013 and we did it in just 11 months.<\/li>\n
  • We passed comprehensive legislation that allows for strategic cyber defense for every governmental entity across the state.<\/li>\n
  • North Dakota State University and Bismarck State College have been designated as Centers of Academic Excellence in Cyber Defense by the National Security Agency and the Department of Homeland Security.<\/li>\n
  • Our partnerships with local entrepreneurs and national organizations like code.org, NICERC and NCWIT are yielding tangible benefits in terms of classroom resources, coding camps and professional development.<\/li>\n
  • In our first year of participating in the SANS Institute \u201cGirls Go CyberStart\u201d and \u201cCollege FastTrack,\u201d we achieved the highest per-capita participation of all states taking part in the programs.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n

    And we plan to do more, like hosting legislative technology showcases, partnering with private-sector cybersecurity leaders such as Palo Alto Networks, and promoting opportunities in computer science for women and girls.\u00a0 \u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

    We\u2019re incredibly lucky that the North Dakota Governor Doug Burgum, Chancellor Mark Hagerott, and my CISO colleague Sean Wiese are likeminded in envisioning the digital future. Numerous other stakeholders, as well as North Dakota citizens, have done much to help build that future.\u00a0\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

    Which brings me to a personal anecdote. My 14-year-old daughter was looking over her class roster for the new school year, and I could tell she was a bit miffed (as only teenagers can be). She handed me a piece of paper and plaintively asked, \u201cWhere are my technology classes?\u201d\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

    Now, my daughter is not necessarily going to be a coder or a bug-hunter, but she certainly has experienced enough technology in her short life to know what has taken years for many of us to learn: You can\u2019t have a digital society unless you start very early. And that means having a strategic plan for cybersecurity that doesn\u2019t wait for you to graduate college or enter the workforce.<\/p>\n

    Shawn Riley is chief information officer of the state of North Dakota.<\/i><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

    State of North Dakota CIO, Shawn Riley, shares insights on leading the cybersecurity and digital transformation across his state.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":156,"featured_media":100898,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[295],"tags":[6182,6829,73],"coauthors":[6828],"class_list":["post-100897","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-customer-spotlight","tag-iot-security","tag-state-of-north-dakota","tag-zero-trust"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/origin-researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/08\/Shawn-Riley.png","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/origin-researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/100897","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/origin-researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/origin-researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/origin-researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/156"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/origin-researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=100897"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/origin-researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/100897\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":100947,"href":"https:\/\/origin-researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/100897\/revisions\/100947"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/origin-researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/100898"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/origin-researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=100897"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/origin-researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=100897"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/origin-researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=100897"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/origin-researchcenter.paloaltonetworks.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/coauthors?post=100897"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}