Custer County to engage CISA cybersecurity services; new IT hire to support systems

Custer County commissioners heard an IT report on Dec. 19 outlining two near-term developments: staff intend to engage the federal Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) for a voluntary cybersecurity assessment, and the county has added an IT specialist to its staff.

Commissioners and IT staff said CISA will offer complimentary assistance — funded at the state level — that can include building security reviews, threat assessments and scenario planning. The county plans to work with CISA to identify near-term priorities and then decide which improvements to pursue based on available funds.

IT staff also described a recent local outage affecting FirstNet (the AT&T-operated network for first responders). Officials said a piece of hardware failed in Canon City, which temporarily degraded FirstNet service for the county; a deployable unit restored service within roughly 24 hours and work to reestablish additional tower links took longer. IT staff told the board that the outage coincided with nation-wide denial-of-service events, which initially increased concern about the outage’s cause.

Finally, IT staff introduced a recently hired technician, John Mapes, who started Dec. 9. Staff described Mapes’ Navy IT background and said he will also support GIS and surveying tasks while assisting with troubleshooting Tyler (county financial/software) connection instability and newer multifunction printer/scanner configurations.

Commissioners asked staff for follow-up on Tyler connectivity and on scheduling of CISA activities.