Securing Government IT:Your Tax Dollars Not At Work

A post on the InformationWeek weblog argues that this is important enough to justify investing tax dollars.

"Securing our federal IT systems and networks is so important that spending tax dollars to educate some 125 federal chief information security officers about the latest in cybersecurity--and to get them to collaborate--seems like a sound investment. That's not the case, however. The government has opted to have private businesses, especially companies that sell IT security products and services, to pick up the tab. Earlier this month, through the auspices of House Government Reform Committee chairman Tom Davis, R.-Va., and the Federal CIO Council, the CISO Exchange was created. What prompted Davis and the CIOs to create the exchange? Very poor grades--a D average--government agencies received on an IT security scorecard; one-quarter of the agencies got an F."