“The widespread adoption of remote work, increasing reliance on e-commerce and growing sophistication of bad actors means the risk of cyberattacks remains high for government and businesses,” according to a late January release from the National Conference of State Legislatures. 

“The extensive use of digital tools such as social media and artificial intelligence adds to the security threat. For example, the use of popular social media apps owned by countries that collect large amounts of data from U.S. consumers has raised national security concerns.”

The NCSL tracking of state legislation shows that many of the 50 states have passed legislation in 2024 to fight the good fight.

For example, last year, California required the Office of Emergency Services to provide a report to the legislature on the state and local cybersecurity grant program and funding to establish and operate the Office of Elections Cybersecurity. Meanwhile, Kansas created a chief information security officer within the judicial and legislative branches and required the attorney general, the Kansas Bureau of Investigation, the secretary of state, state treasurer and others to appoint chief information security officers. And South Dakota allocated $7 million to its Attorney general to be distributed to create cybersecurity service initiatives in counties and municipalities around the state. 

But, even with the heightened concern of legislatures about this issue, there are a handful of ongoing trends that have made their task still more difficult. 

A few that were pointed out in a September 2024 Deloitte-NASCIO Report included;

• Underlining the NCSL’s comments, this report found that “41% of State Chief Information Security Officers (CISOs) reported they were ‘not very confident’ or ‘not confident at all,’ about protecting their states from Ai threats. 

• “Nearly 40% of CISOs say funding falls short of what they need to keep assets and citizens safe.”

• Bad actors and their cyberattacks are growing increasingly sophisticated

• There’s an ongoing talent crisis. “Nearly half of state CISOs said cybersecurity staffing is a top five challenge, even as demand for specialists continues to rise.”

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