Lakewood, Colo. We’ve been saying it all year: no one is too small or too remote. Cybersecurity is for everybody. That’s why this year we in Region 8 were excited to kick off Cybersecurity Awareness Month a little early. There’s a lot to share, learn, and do when it comes to how we, working together, Secure our World.
We started by joining the National Rural Water Association at their annual WaterPro conference, held this year in Aurora, Colorado. We, EPA, and our water partners in rural water and tech, including the great states of Colorado, Utah, and Wyoming, talked water and cybersecurity during the water and cyber panel. To learn more about how you can protect your water system, check out our free cyber vulnerability scanning for water utilities.
RD Graff addressed the water and cyber panel at WaterPro, joined by our water liaison and colleagues at EPA while our External Affairs, Stakeholder Engagement and Regional staff provided information at the CISA booth
Also in late September, we visited our federal colleagues at the Department of Energy’s National Renewable Energy Lab in Golden, Colorado. We discussed the evolving nature of technology in energy sector security and the role Artificial Intelligence might play in moving resilience from the “grid edge” to mainstream best practices.
R8 Staff join NREL researchers at the lab’s campus in Golden, Colo.
The most important player in Secure Our World, however, is the individual. Each of us can respond to the call to action this October by taking four simple steps:
- Use strong passwords (the longer and more random, the better);
- Enable multifactor authentication when offered, have a second device verify your use;
- Think before you click, learn to recognize and report phishing and other email scams;and,
- Regularly update software to patch vulnerabilities.
When it comes to cybersecurity, what we all do counts. If you don’t know where to start at home or at work, contact us at Region 8!