Securing Smart Cities, the not-for-profit global initiative that addresses the cyber security challenges of smart cities, last week released guidelines on the role of information security within a smart city department (SCD): The Smart City Department Cyber Security role and implications. Kaspersky Lab’s Mohamad Amin Hasbini, Senior Security Researcher and Securing Smart Cities board member is one of the authors of this paper.
“…As each organization requires its own smartness assessment and development, it has become clear that responsibilities, processes execution and decision making need to be institutionalized”, the paper reads, going to to state that “smart city departments” or “smart city offices” are to be established in the large organizations to arrange what is called “smart city compatibility”. Their function will become not unlike IT departmets in the 2000s: independent smart city departments will emerge within the organizations (governments and businesses) isolation their political aspects from the technological ones, the paper predicts, while managing the city requirements and controlling its operations.
The new document discusses “the Smart City Department information security role, its influence on technology adoption, services quality… and communication resilience”. The guide itself is not a detailed testing or assessment program, but rather an illustration of key elements that organizations need to be aware of to achieve the best safety and resilience of complex information systems that will be in the foundation of smart cities.
Information security is paramount here, for self-obvious reasons, and SCDs are responsible for “digesting” cyber security organizational requirements, providing support to Information security teams in defining the technologies needed and the cyber security strategy to be adopted, paper authors say. These requirements should also be communicated and made fully understandable to decision makers.
“These guidelines are yet another step towards Securing Smart Cities (SSC), as the name of the initiative suggests. We’re trying to enhance everyone’s understanding of the smart city requirements, by developing useful insights and sharing expertise with the people who will be responsible for the development and management of smart cities. The document is based on the experience of the SSC community members, who are involved in large scale cyber governance, as well as other security specialists: from penetration testers to industrial security experts,” said Mohamad Amin Hasbini.
The paper’s authors state that in reality SCDs have already been established in a number of cities aimed at acquiring “smart” status. About 80 cities in the world are expected to become “smart” by 2025, and eight years in this field is a very short term.
For a full copy of the Smart City Department Cyber Security Role and Implications guide, please visit: http://securingsmartcities.org/?p=483?utm_source=smm_kb&utm_medium=Ww_kb_o_2903
For a full copy of the Cyber Security Guidelines for Smart City Technology Adoption, please visit: http://securingsmartcities.org/wp-content/uploads/2015/11/Guidlines_for_Safe_Smart_Cities.pdf
For more information, and to see the most recent updates on Securing Smart Cities activities, please visit: http://securingsmartcities.org.
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