Adoption of cybersecurity policies by local governments 2020

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dc.contributor.authorNorris, Donald
dc.contributor.authorMateczun, Laura
dc.date.accessioned2023-11-01T15:56:12Z
dc.date.available2023-11-01T15:56:12Z
dc.date.issued2023-10
dc.description.abstractThis paper should be of interest to the readers of this journal because it addresses a subject that has received little scholarly attention; namely, local government cybersecurity. The U.S. has over 90,000 units of local government, of which almost 39,000 are “general purpose” units (i.e., municipalities, counties, towns and townships). On average, these governments do not practice cybersecurity effectively (Norris, et al., 2019 and 2020). One possible reason is that they do not adopt and/or implement highly recommended cybersecurity policies. In this paper, we examine local government adoption or lack of adoption of cybersecurity policies using data from three surveys. Norris, et al, 2019 & 2020; Hatcher, et al., 2020; and Norris and Mateczun, 2023. It will probably not be surprising that our first finding is that, by and large, local governments still do a poor good job of adopting and implementing cybersecurity policies. Thus, our first recommendation is that these governments must take whatever actions are needed to ensure high levels of cybersecurity. If they do not, the consequences will be painful and costly, as demonstrated by examples presented in the text. Among these actions, we next recommend that local governments adopt and effectively implement the highly recommended cybersecurity policies discussed in the concluding section. Last, as we have recommended previously, we again call upon local governments to create and maintain within their organizations a culture of cybersecurity – one in which all parties in these governments fully understand and support cybersecurity at the highest levels in their governments.en_US
dc.description.sponsorshipWe wish to thank the International City/County Management Association (ICMA) for the ICMA Research Fellowship under which the research for this work was conducted (published by ICMA in 2021 as “A Look at Local government Cybersecurity in 2020”). We also thank ICMA for encouraging us to revise it for publication for academic audiences. The initial work was directed principally at audiences of local government practitioners.en_US
dc.description.urihttps://digitalcommons.kennesaw.edu/jcerp/vol2023/iss2/9/en_US
dc.format.extent19 pagesen_US
dc.genrejournal articlesen_US
dc.identifierdoi:10.13016/m2fvpv-cxso
dc.identifier.citationNorris, Donald F. PhD and Mateczun, Laura K. JD (2023) "Adoption of cybersecurity policies by local governments 2020," Journal of Cybersecurity Education, Research and Practice: Vol. 2023: No. 2, Article 9. Available at: https://digitalcommons.kennesaw.edu/jcerp/vol2023/iss2/9en_US
dc.identifier.urihttp://hdl.handle.net/11603/30482
dc.language.isoen_USen_US
dc.publisherKennesaw State Universityen_US
dc.relation.isAvailableAtThe University of Maryland, Baltimore County (UMBC)
dc.relation.ispartofUMBC School of Public Policy Collection
dc.relation.ispartofUMBC Faculty Collection
dc.relation.ispartofUMBC Maryland Institute for Policy Analysis & Research (MIPAR)
dc.rightsThis item is likely protected under Title 17 of the U.S. Copyright Law. Unless on a Creative Commons license, for uses protected by Copyright Law, contact the copyright holder or the author.en_US
dc.rightsAttribution 4.0 International (CC BY 4.0 DEED)*
dc.rights.urihttps://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/*
dc.titleAdoption of cybersecurity policies by local governments 2020en_US
dc.typeTexten_US
dcterms.creatorhttps://orcid.org/0009-0009-7997-5137en_US
dcterms.creatorhttps://orcid.org/0000-0002-5540-8308en_US

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