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Opinion
Security in 2007: No Surprises Here (Well Maybe a Few)
11/9/2007
Voss noted that nothing works like a problem to drive a solution. He also argued that CIOs must realize that IT security is a problem that they themselves have to solve and they shouldn't expect that they will necessarily be given additional money to do it. In their case he used efficiencies in the network budget to enhance IT security. Nichols pointed out that you cannot enforce a policy if you don't have a policy. You can find out more about LSU's security practices and policies at http://www.lsu.edu/itsecurity and http://www.lsu.edu/itpolicy.Nichol's view is consistent with the observations of Joe Sartin, CDW-G's senior sales manager to higher education, who notes that it is hard to implement IT security in an environment that doesn't have institutional security policies and standards.
Apples and Oranges: What's Going on Here?
One of issues considered for the first time this year in the CDW-G survey is the relationship between IT Security and Physical Security, a topic that I discussed in my Sept. 14 Campus Security column "Converged Security: Can Ex-Cops, Propeller Heads, and Bean Counters Make Nice?" When asked "How would you describe your campus' integration of IT and physical security," 25 percent of the CDW-G respondents answered "fully integrated" or "mostly integrated." The survey was surprised at the slow integration and concluded "only 25 percent of campuses have successfully converged their programs."
By contrast, I was surprised that 25 percent responded that there was any degree of integration because a month earlier I had been unable to find a single campus that had converged the management of physical and IT security! What's going on here?
After talking to a few campuses it became clear what happened. Surveys are difficult to write, and their interpretation is tricky. The precise wording of a question can affect the responses. Similarly, subtle differences in how a word or term is defined can lead to varying conclusions. We were comparing apples to oranges.
The Real Story on Convergence in Higher Education
Why has the administrative convergence of physical and IT security, which is relatively common in the corporate sector, not gained traction in higher education? The corporate sector is profit-driven and views "convergence" through the lens of an administrative hierarchy; administrative convergence of physical and IT security is increasingly common. Higher education, on the other hand, has as its core mission research and education and administratively is highly decentralized; it does not see the administrative convergence of physical and IT security as a necessary condition to the integration of the physical and IT security functions.
Voss explained that distinction using LSU as an example.
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