Digital and IT are pleased to announce that the Hounslow Council has achieved a new security certification, Cyber Essentials Plus!
Cyber Essentials is a Government backed scheme to aid organisations of all sizes in the UK to protect themselves from the most common forms of cyber-attacks. The scheme consists of two levels, the basic certification which is a technical self-assessment of the organisation’s cyber security and the much more involved and difficult to pass Cyber Essentials Plus which not only requires the self-assessment but requires third party penetration testers to assess and verify your cyber security.
We applied for the second level, CE+, are pleased to be among the first public sector organisations to be successful.
Our Security team worked alongside third party security assessors and our own Digital and IT team during the run up to Christmas to complete this work. We even had a bit of a ‘high-five’ moment when we learned (during our Christmas get-together) that the penetration testers had been unable to forcibly breach the network security measures we have in place in our new building. They needed to be granted access by our team to carry out the assessment. The team allowed themselves an extra couple of chicken wings from the Christmas finger-food buffet that day ..it was wild 🙂
The Cyber Essentials Plus badge assures our residents and partners that we provide a secure IT service by proving that we have cyber security measures in place which helps to reduce our risk of cyber-attacks significantly (this scheme quotes up to 80%).
In achieving this certification it is a clear indication that we are doing the right thing when it comes to securing and protecting data.
With Digital playing an important role going forward, we are committed to maintaining the high standards we set for ourselves and ensure that we maintain and exceed the standards recognised through this certification for years to come.
Useful Links:
https://www.ncsc.gov.uk/cyberessentials/overview
https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/cyber-essentials-scheme-overview