Montana
Cybersecurity poses risk for Montana universities, also small businesses
![Cybersecurity poses risk for Montana universities, also small businesses](https://missoulacurrent.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/2280875-fibre-broadband-strands-image.jpg)
Montana’s flagship campuses pledged Tuesday to shore up their cybersecurity, however College of Montana President Seth Bodnar mentioned comparable threats to small companies additionally will be devastating.
Roughly 45% of cybersecurity assaults are in opposition to small companies, and of people who face assaults, some 60% fold, Bodnar mentioned. He and a Montana State College-Bozeman official pledged to deal with their very own expertise safety shortcomings introduced to lawmakers in a Legislative Audit Division report, however Bodnar additionally mentioned Missoula School is providing nationally acknowledged training in cybersecurity.
“I additionally imagine we’ve an obligation as a college to be a spot the place we are able to present that coaching, that training, to safe Most important Avenue companies within the state of Montana,” Bodnar mentioned.
The Division of Enterprise and Data Know-how at Missoula School notes on its web site the Nationwide Safety Company and the U.S. Division of Homeland Safety have recognized the faculty as a Nationwide Heart of Educational Excellence in cyber-defense two-year training. Bodnar additionally gave a nod to the $1.5 million the Montana Legislature allotted in 2021 to a Cyber Hub on the faculty.
In feedback to the Legislative Audit Committee, Bodnar mentioned Missoula School already has helped practice the Montana Nationwide Guard and is in discussions about different trainings it might maintain, together with with the Division of Commerce. He famous the campus was not too long ago authorised for a bachelor’s of science to construct on its two-year cybersecurity program, and it’s engaged on a certificates and graduate coaching as effectively.
Bodnar’s feedback adopted a presentation by Miki Cestnik, data programs audit supervisor with the Legislative Audit Division, on safety findings from a current audit of MSU and UM and an evaluation of the position of the Montana Board of Regents and Workplace of the Commissioner of Greater Training in data expertise safety.
“The principle level of this report is that everybody performs a task in data safety, and everybody right here has some work to do,” Cestnik mentioned.
Cestnik mentioned the upper training establishments collect, use and create information, and so they maintain scholar information, monetary information, private well being information, and analysis information. Through the audit, she mentioned contractors recognized vulnerabilities at each campuses, and they should safeguard the knowledge and shield in opposition to service disruptions.
“With all of these kinds of information in a single location, larger training establishments are a wealthy goal,” Cestnik mentioned.
Nonetheless, Cestnik additionally mentioned the Board of Regents and Commissioner’s Workplace want to offer extra steering to campuses in threat administration and governance. Generally, she mentioned cybersecurity is changing into extra expensive, and he or she famous the associated fee to UM for HIPAA particular cybersecurity insurance coverage shot as much as $44,000 from $11,000 as a result of UM’s safety program posed too excessive a threat (UM declined the protection however continues to be typically coated for cybersecurity breaches, in keeping with the audit).
Commissioner Clayton Christian mentioned he agreed with the findings, and he additionally famous a workgroup already had shaped to sort out a few of the challenges and deliberate to have a look at greatest practices. Christian mentioned the work has been happening on the campuses, and it’s expensive, however he agreed it wanted to be extra coordinated.
“Of issues that maintain me up at evening, cybersecurity is actually certainly one of them,” Christian mentioned. “It’s not going away. It’s getting extra complicated. How we deal with that’s actually a part of that complexity.”
Sen. Pat Flowers, a Belgrade Democrat, mentioned in his expertise, it’s simple to spend an unlimited amount of cash on cybersecurity, and he puzzled if there have been tips for the campuses.
“It does really feel a bit like a bottomless pit by way of how a lot cash you may spend on cybersecurity,” Flowers mentioned. “Is there a typical? Like how a lot is sufficient, or what stage of threat is appropriate? Since you’ll by no means get to zero. How do you make that calculus in how a lot to put money into cybersecurity to scale back threat right down to what stage?”
Cestnik mentioned she didn’t have a quantity, however she mentioned campuses must establish a method and set up their threat tolerance and thresholds and tips on how to prioritize cybersecurity in an effort to decide how a lot to spend. She additionally agreed with Flowers’ evaluation: “It may be a bottomless pit.”
In her report, Cestnik additionally famous turnover at MSU and hiring challenges at UM have been among the many issues. Bodnar famous two nationwide recruitments for a chief data safety officer failed, so UM educated and promoted internally as a substitute. He famous Montana has some 3,683 cybersecurity jobs, and 1,100 of them are unfilled.
“There’s a large warfare for expertise,” Bodnar mentioned.
Federal laws management a few of the information safety, however Cestnik additionally mentioned larger training officers have some decisions in how they determine to supervise data expertise safety. For instance, she mentioned the state can take a centralized method or it could take a decentralized method, and each choices have labored effectively in different states.
Rep. Terry Moore, a Billings Republican, mentioned he want to see the college representatives return in six months or so for an replace, and Chair Rep. Denise Hayman, a Bozeman Democrat, mentioned she concurred, as did Commissioner Christian.
“It looks like given the importance of the danger administration points which were recognized, together with a complete host of strategic conversations which are going to be happening within the background, it is likely to be good to have a comply with up report,” Moore mentioned.
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Montana
Sheehy, PERC and the future of public lands conservation in Montana
![Sheehy, PERC and the future of public lands conservation in Montana](https://hagadone.media.clients.ellingtoncms.com/static-4/westernnews/images/default-social.jpg)
A great recent article by Chris D’Angelo reports on the connection between Tim Sheehy, the Republican challenging Jon Tester for his senate seat, and PERC, the Bozeman-based Property and Environment Research Center that promotes what it calls “free market environmentalism.”
While Montanans might wonder about Sheehy’s background and policy positions given the shifting sands in his explanations, the fact that he was on the board of PERC is not in question — despite his failure to disclose that fact as required by Senate rules which his campaign says is an “omission” that’s being “amended.”
For those who have long been in the conservation, environmental, and public lands policy arena, PERC is a very well-known entity. As noted on its IRS 990 non-profit reporting form, the center is “dedicated to advancing conservation through markets, incentives, property rights and partnerships” which “applies economic thinking to environmental problems.”
But to put it somewhat more simply, PERC believes that private land ownership results in better conservation of those lands under the theory — and it is a disputable theory — that if you own the land and resources, you take better care of it due to its investment value. This has long been their across the board approach to land, water, endangered species and resource extraction.
If one wanted to dispute that theory, it certainly wouldn’t be difficult to do, particularly in Montana where checking the list of Superfund sites left behind by private industries and owners bears indisputable evidence of the myth that private ownership means better conservation of those resources.
In fact, the theory falls on its face since, when “using economic thinking” the all-too-often result is to exploit the resources to maximize profit as quickly as possible. And again, this example is applicable across a wide spectrum of resources. In Montana, that can mean anything from degrading rangeland by putting more livestock on it than it can sustain to, as in Plum Creek’s sad history, leaving behind stumpfields filled with noxious weeds on their vast private — once public — land holdings.
None of this is particularly a mystery, yet PERC has sucked down enormous amounts of funding from anti-conservation sources for more than four decades as it tries mightily to put lipstick on the pig of the all-too-obvious results of runaway private lands resource extraction.
Running one of the most high-stakes senate campaigns in the nation, however, produces a lot of tap-dancing around the truth in an effort to convince voters that you’re for whatever position will garner the most votes come Election Day.
In that regard, both Sheehy and PERC are scuttling sideways in their positions. Given the overwhelming support for “keeping public lands in public hands” in Montana, PERC now claims it “firmly believes that public lands should stay in public hands. We do not advocate for nor support privatization or divestiture.”
Funny that, given its previous and very long-held position that private ownership of lands and waters is the key to conservation. Likewise, Sheehy’s position, “that “public lands must stay in public hands” is completely the opposite from the one he held only a year ago, and parrots PERC not only in its verbiage, but in its realization of which way public sentiment and the electoral winds are blowing.
Since what’s at stake is nothing less than the future of public lands in the Big Sky State, it behooves us to demand specific policy positions in writing from all candidates for public office — including the race for Montana’s Senate seat.
Montana
Couple walking across the U.S. reach Montana
![Couple walking across the U.S. reach Montana](https://ewscripps.brightspotcdn.com/dims4/default/ef0ef06/2147483647/strip/true/crop/1920x1008+0+36/resize/1200x630!/quality/90/?url=https%3A%2F%2Fx-default-stgec.uplynk.com%2Fausw%2Fslices%2Fb07%2F08eb16cf8af2400d815b1b31a3092ff6%2Fb072d13bff0d486991df2aab9847b7eb%2Fposter_e28a1c41bf4f4ec9a1691d007caa5229.jpeg)
WHITE SULPHUR SPRINGS — A couple from Missouri have a goal to walk through every state in the lower 48.
Paige and Torin – known by their social media handle “Walking America Couple” – are in leg three of a five-leg, cross-country journey.
They’ve already traversed through 21 states, and on Thursday, their journey brought them to just outside White Sulphur Springs.
“Even out here in the more rural open space, we still make a lot of friends on the side of the road. People often stop and ask what we’re doing, or stop to see if we need water or food,” says Paige.
Each leg takes the couple roughly six months to one year, though they take short breaks in-between. They’re also completing the entire journey with their dog Jak.
“I think he loves the adventure more than we do,” Paige adds.
Through rain, shine, snow, and severe weather warnings, the couple have not been deterred, their purpose and mission propelling them.
“We would like to set the example that you can find contentment under almost any circumstance,” says Torin. “I started out the journey an incredibly cynical person, and it was through these repeated interactions of kindness with people that I had otherwise written off in the past, that my perspective began to change dramatically,” he adds.
Now, their journey is helping to spread the same happiness they’ve discovered to those they encounter on their journeys.
“We hope to be the example that we’re, as humans, all more malleable than we think,” says Paige.
For more information, click here to visit their website.
Montana
Montana lawmakers looking at possible future marijuana dispensary regulations
![Montana lawmakers looking at possible future marijuana dispensary regulations](https://ewscripps.brightspotcdn.com/dims4/default/8125d6c/2147483647/strip/true/crop/1920x1008+0+36/resize/1200x630!/quality/90/?url=https%3A%2F%2Fewscripps.brightspotcdn.com%2Fcb%2F58%2Fefce50b74147866236eae564365a%2Fmarijuana.jpg)
HELENA — Since the launch of Montana’s adult-use recreational marijuana system in 2022, the state has put limits on who can enter the market. Now, state lawmakers are looking at possibly extending the limits, but in a much different form.
Earlier this month, the Montana Legislature’s Economic Affairs Interim Committee held a preliminary discussion on several marijuana-related bills that could be proposed for the 2025 session. One would freeze the number of marijuana dispensaries and other facilities for two years.
Since the start of legal sales, Montana has had a moratorium, allowing only providers who had been licensed in the state’s medical marijuana system to join the recreational market. It was initially set to expire June 30, 2023, but the Legislature voted last year to extend it two more years.
While the number of licensees was limited, those providers were allowed to open additional “licensed premises,” including dispensaries. The proposed legislation – still in a very early form and subject to change – would prevent any business from adding a new licensed premise between July 1, 2025, and June 30, 2027.
“This time, we’re talking about a freeze on all cannabis-related business location licensing, so no new growers, no new kitchens, no new storage facilities, no new dispensaries – they’re the part the public are really going to notice,” said Pepper Petersen, president and CEO of the Montana Cannabis Guild.
The committee referred to the proposal as an extension of the moratorium, but marijuana industry representatives said it’s essentially an entirely new policy, because it would remove the requirement that licensees be former medical providers. That would allow licensees to sell or transfer their businesses to new owners who haven’t previously been in the system.
Petersen said people in the industry understand that many Montanans feel there are enough – or too many – dispensaries in the state. He believes local governments should be taking more active steps to limit the growth of dispensaries through zoning or other regulations.
“We’ve suggested to local governments for two years or more now that they put a number of restrictions on when, where and how dispensaries can open,” he said.
Local governments like Cascade County have looked at ways to regulate marijuana businesses. Next month, the city of Missoula is set to hold a public hearing on a proposal to pause issuing business licenses for new dispensaries.
“When Missoula, Montana, one of the most liberal cities in the state – one of the most marijuana-friendly cities in the country – has said we’ve got too many dispensaries, that reverberates through the state Legislature,” Petersen said.
During the committee meeting, lawmakers also talked about putting together a bill draft to clarify what authority local governments have to put regulations on marijuana businesses. In addition, they looked at a “cleanup” bill to make some technical changes to marijuana laws, as well as a proposed resolution to support the federal SAFER Banking Act, which would allow legal marijuana businesses to access banking services. The committee is set to take a closer look at all of the proposals, including potential amendments, at a meeting in August.
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