website<\/a> says the SECURE grant program offers municipalities \u201cthe tools to prevent, detect, and respond to increasingly sophisticated and dangerous cyber threats to critical water infrastructure while strengthening services that millions of New Yorkers rely on every day.\u201d<\/p>\nCity of Ithaca Public Information Officer Alan Karasin said the funds ensure the city\u2019s compliance with state cybersecurity regulations by Jan. 1, 2027. The requirements are set by the state Department of Health and the Department of Environmental Conservation.<\/p>\n
Karasin said the funds will be split between two city treatment systems. Karasin said the city will allocate $50,000 to its wastewater treatment plant and $25,000 to its water treatment plant. Karasin said both grants aim to strengthen security for the plants’ supervisory control and data acquisition (SCADA) platforms, the software and technology that runs the infrastructure.<\/p>\n
\u201cSCADA systems are used to control tank levels, pumping systems, blowing equipment, chemical feed rates, communications, alarm systems, and general notifications,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
The city already implemented security controls and policy requirements mandated by the state Department of Health, according to Karasin. He said the city benefits from shared services through the New York State Division of Homeland Security and Emergency Services, including examination of local infrastructure risks and enhanced asset protection. He said the grant funding will be used to close security gaps and confirm ongoing compliance and resilience.<\/p>\n
Karasin said the water treatment plant received upgrades in 2016, but its security system needs to be enhanced to meet new state requirements. Karasin said the wastewater treatment plant, built in 1986, relies on a basic SCADA system that requires a \u201ccomplete upgrade.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cThe good news is both the WTP and WWTP are largely stand-alone systems meaning that they aren’t generally connected to the wider internet,\u201d Karasin said.<\/p>\n
Historically, the city has paid for these security and system assessments using operating funds and capital improvement projects, according to Karasin. He said the water treatment plant receives routine cybersecurity audits through the city’s broader cybersecurity program.<\/p>\n
Philip O’Dell is a news reporter for the\u00a0Ithaca Times\u00a0and\u00a0Finger Lakes Community Newspapers, covering various topics that include local government and crime. Reach him via email at philip@ithacatimes.com<\/a>.\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Four Tompkins County municipalities secured a total of $135,000 in state grant funding to protect local drinking water…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":328473,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[86628,66484,123504,49109,123505,5865,9985,9,11,10,49,51,50,123503,105026,52898,123502,94937,123506,123501],"class_list":["post-328472","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-new-york","tag-computer-security","tag-cyberattack","tag-environmental-engineering","tag-fresh-water","tag-hydraulic-engineering","tag-infrastructure","tag-ithaca","tag-new-york","tag-new-york-headlines","tag-new-york-news","tag-new-york-state","tag-new-york-state-headlines","tag-new-york-state-news","tag-scada","tag-tompkins-county","tag-wastewater","tag-wastewater-treatment","tag-water-supply","tag-water-supply-network","tag-water-treatment"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/328472","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=328472"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/328472\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/328473"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=328472"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=328472"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=328472"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}