Cyber Attacks: Securing Agencies’ICT Systems
. In the government sector, the Australian Signals Directorate (ASD)3 has estimated that between January and December 2012, there were over 1790 security incidents against Australian Government agencies. Of these, 685 ... were considered serious enough to warrant a Cyber Security Operations Centre response. <br/> The protection of Australian Government systems and information from unauthorised access and use is a key ... responsibility of agencies, having regard to their business operations and specific risks. In the context of a national government, those risks can range from threats to national security through to the disclosure ... ... Cyber-security strategy needs consistent implementation and periodic reviews ... List of 35 mitigation controls against cyber intrusions are a basic tool of information security strategy of the Australian Government. Top four are: 1. application whitelisting, 2. patching ... application, 3. patching operating systems, 4. minimising administrative privileges. Analysis by the ANAO helps to fill gaps and to direct next steps.
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Audit of the Government, Government-guaranteed and Municipal Debt Management Information Systems in the Ministry of Finance of the Republic of Bulgaria
? The audit covered the period from 01.01.2013 to 31.12.2013 and investigated four major areas: IT system strategy and general management; IT security and controls against disasters; Operational controls ... The main audit question studied during the audit was: Are the government, government-guaranteed (SDMS) and municipal debt management information systems (CMDR) at the Ministry of Finance effective ... and Documentation; Application Controls. ... ... Even effective and modern IT systems require improvements and updates to ensure their security and accountability ... the established system is effective and provides updated, complete and correct information. Nevertheless the audit report points out areas of security, application controls as well as documentation as the subjects ... For the management of the government, government-guaranteed and municipal debt the Ministry of Finance has established an advanced integrated information infrastructure. According to Bulgarian SAI ... that need further improvement and optimization.
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Performance Audit of Public Debt Management Information Systems
of information systems in the public debt management process and having considered legal requirements to information security, State Audit Office of Georgia conducted Performance Audit of Public Debt Management ... implemented by the Public Debt and External Financing Department of the MOF. Hereby, the audit team also to assessed systems’ data integrity and security. In the course of the audit, the audit team also studied ... The usage and development of the information technologies in public financial management is an important priority of the country at the phase of intensive implementation of electronic governance ... ... More effective IT governance needed ... financial institutions. Audit conducted by the State Audit Office of Georgia has revealed security and governance shortcomings related to management and usage of these systems. ... Importance of effective performance of public debt management e-systems may be explained by the world’s increased dependence on such systems. In parallel with the performance audit of debt management ... information systems of the Ministry Of Finance of Georgia, Supreme Audit Institutions of 11 countries also studied this topic, both in terms of systems’ performance and their practical application by local
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Activities of the state in implementing the e-health system - Do the state, doctors and patients benefit from ehealth?
and social services and patients are also becoming more and more demanding about the volume and quality of the services provided. The more extensive and systematic implementation of e-health solutions helps ... Estonia’s population is aging and the share of elderly people is increasing, as fewer children are being born and people are living longer. This creates a constantly growing need for health ... make the health system more efficient, improves people’s health via more effective prevention, raises the awareness of patients and also contributes to the more reasonable use of health resources ... ... Why state, doctors and patients do not benefit from e-Health as much as they could? ... The report reviews whether the objectives set to the e-Health – ambitious multiyear program of Estonian Government - have been achieved. They are: higher quality of the health service and more ... efficient organisation of health care. As SAI Estonia found out, wide range problems started from two basic points: lack of strategic manager and unrealisitc schedule.
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Traffic Ticketing information system
The audit included two areas of focus - the environment surrounding the Traffic Ticketing Information System - the System (designed to input, process, manage and collect payment for the traffic ... tickets) and also the internal environment of the System that guarantees the quality of its performance and safety. ... Security can hinder effectiveness ... SAI of Kuwait analysed system supporting collection of the traffic tickets - data input, processing and management. What was found was lack of basic safety measures, that hindered the effectiveness ... of the system.
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Report on the problems connected with the development and implementation of the digitally based Shared Medication Record
ensured an adequate level of IT security? 4) Has the Ministry of Health informed the Finance Committee of the Danish Folketing (parliament) correctly on the development and implementation of the SMR system? ... The purpose of the examination was to assess whether the department of the Danish Ministry of Health, the Danish National eHealth Authority (NHA) and the five regions that are responsible ... for the hospitals have made an adequate effort to develop and implement the Shared Medication Record (SMR). With the SMR, data on the citizens’ medication can be shared across hospitals, general practitioners, etc ... ... Involvement of key participants necessary from the very beginning ... and processes leading to implementation problems, governance not involving key players, and IT security organisation. ... Digitally based Shared Medication Record is basis of the complex healthcare system. Rigsrevisionen analysed unsolved issues related to unclear business case, insufficient analysis of work flows
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Report on the government’s processing of confidential data on persons and companies
Rigsrevisionen has examined how eight government institutions process confidential data on persons and companies in 11 selected IT systems. The report is based on IT audits carried out in connection ... with the annual audit in the spring 2014. The purpose of the audit was to assess whether confidential data on persons and companies are adequately protected by the government institutions. ... ... Inadequate protection of confidential data ... , inadequate protection of confidential data may also erode the citizens’ and companies’ confidence in government data security. That may eventually become a barrier for the continued efforts to implement ... If a government institution does not protect confidential data to the extent necessary, the risk that third parties get unauthorized access to the data is very high. In opinion of the Danish SAI ... e-government and make government administration more efficient.
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Auditing the National Rationing System
The audit was to investigate the data quality, validity and reliability of two sub-systems (Ration Card and Ration Distribution) of a National Rationing System (Ration System) with the comparison ... to the rules and regulations in order to make an assessment of soundness of the Ration system and its related operations. ... Unreliable databases trigger all kinds of possible problems ... Ministry responsible for functioning of the National Rationing System developed to automate and optimize the delivery of essential subsidized commodities to eligible beneficiaries and providing state ... with reliable information fails its job.
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Effectiveness of the Tax Administration of the Republic of Slovenia in the execution of modernisation projects of the Slovenian duty information system and decreasing the number of duty sub-accounts
The Tax Administration of the Republic of Slovenia (hereinafter: the Tax Administration) is responsible for collecting taxes, fees and other compulsory levies (hereinafter: duties ... ). These are the revenue of the state budget, municipal budgets, the Health Insurance Institute of Slovenia, the Institute for Pension and Disability Insurance of Slovenia (hereinafter: duties recipients) and indirectly ... of the European Union budget. In order to improve its operations, the Tax Authority decided to modernise the Slovenian duties’ collection information system. It used this opportunity to implement also a second ... ... Shaky coordination of investments in important systems ... Slovenian SAI traced a series of problems in management of crucial IT investments in tax administration. Apart from promising goals, unclear business case gave a start to many problems at next stages ... of the project, involving additional spendings, delays and errors in data processing.
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