Utah System of Higher Education Requests $2 Million for Security
- By Matt Holden
- Mar 03, 2015
The Utah System of Higher Education has asked state lawmakers for an additional $2.1 million in order to protect universities such as Utah State from IT security threats. This would be added to the initial $4.5 million requested. The money would be used to upgrade institutions’ hardware defense systems against hackers and provide additional IT staffing, Including a USHE Chief Information Security Officer and an external security team to provide oversight to tall campuses.
The request is the first coordinated effort among IT chiefs system-wide, said Eric Hawley, USU’s chief information officer and associate vice president for Information Technology.
“I think it’s an important and necessary request from the commissioner,” Hawley said. “It’s much more effective for us to work together as a system.”
The funding request says Utah’s colleges and universities are “relatively small players in an IT ‘arms race’ with mostly unknown adversaries during a time of constrained budgets and resulting efforts for organizational efficiencies.”
Colleges such as Stanford, Emory University and the University of Maryland have all experience security breaches, forcing them to spend significant resources trying to repair the damage.
About the Author
Matt Holden is an Associate Content Editor for 1105 Media, Inc. He received his MFA and BA in journalism from Ball State University in Muncie, Indiana. He currently writes and edits for Occupational Health & Safety magazine, and Security Today.