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Audit faults Virginia school for deaf, blind - Washington Times
A Virginia audit showed inadequate security policies have put the Virginia School for the Deaf and Blind facility at risk for information-technology breaches and uncovered several lax accounting issues associated with a massive construction project at the school.
The 173-year-old school lacks most of the information “to develop and implement an information-security program that provides assurance over data confidentiality, integrity and availability,” according to the audit, released even though theschool is shifting instructional computers away from the oversight ofthe state’s information-technology agency.
Walter Kucharski, state auditor of public accounts, said that the report should merely serve as a warning.
“Is anybody stealing from them today, or has anything bad happened? No,” he said. “This is basically a cautionary tale to say, ‘You need to think about this stuff.’ “
The school received about $71 million for a massive construction effort in orderto consolidate the Hampton School with the Staunton school, but there were several lax accounting issues, the audit found.
For example, the school paid seven invoices that included travel expenses without support, and one invoice included overcharges for shipping fees. The superintendent also did not approve two of the construction invoices reviewed, and approved one of the architect and engineer invoices after it was paid.
School Superintendent Nancy C. Armstrong said staffers have corrected the errors.
Mr. Kucharski said the computer-security concerns are more about the school being so small, and less about institutional problems.
“If you lose one or two people, you could knock your IT department off, and they wouldnt know how to react, and the same thing is true with the accounting department,” he said.
Ms. Armstrong said the school is addressing that concern by implementing an information-security program that includes more cross-training,
“We’ve always done cross-training, internal controls,” she said. “Weve just stepped that up.”
The school is currently in the process of dumping many of its computers to relieve itself of oversight from the Virginia Information Technologies Agency (VITA), which oversees the information-technology structure for state agencies.
The schools annual bill from VITA totaled about $335,000, and so it has started the process of transferring instructional computers away from VITA oversight, while keeping administrative functions on the network.
“The school, because of the way it had been set up as a state agency, fell under the purview of VITA, and no other school of any type was falling under the purview of VITA,” said state Sen. Emmett W. Hanger Jr., Augusta Republican, who sits on the schools Board of Visitors.
The school still has 60 computers on campus until they can replace them with their own, a process that should be completed by Christmas, said Ms. Armstrong.
The defense giant Northrop Grumman runs the states data centers, help desks and other IT operations as part of a $2.3 billion contract — the largest single-payer contract in the history of Virginia state government. Last year, the state agreed to extend the 10-year contract by an additional three years and pay nearly $200 million more after state agencies and the company clashed over payments and the quality of services provided.
“I’m concerned that theyre a small agency starting out, and I want to get them started out on the right foot,” said Mr. Kucharski. “If you dont start doing this and something goes wrong, its going to go wrong very quickly.”
However, the school was not without complaints of its own. As part of a statewide effort, the state’s Payroll Services Bureau on Jan. 1, 2010, started processing certain payroll functions for the school. There have been a number of errors and issues during the first year, so the school still retains its own payroll staff, Ms. Armstrong wrote in response to the audit.
“When you’re talking about government services and money, it’s costing us double, which doesn’t quite seem efficient to me,” said Ms. Armstrong. “I thought it was a redundancy, and still think its a redundancy.”
But state Comptroller David A. Von Moll, while acknowledging issues with the school early on during the transition, said that overall, the new system is working well.
“We’re in routine communication with all of our customers,” he said. “Were operating under the assumption that things are going smoothly.”
“I’m pretty confident that they would like to go back to doing it on their own if they had their druthers,” he did add.
A Virginia audit showed inadequate security policies have put the Virginia School for the Deaf and Blind facility at risk for information-technology breaches and uncovered several lax accounting issues associated with a massive construction project at the school.
The 173-year-old school lacks most of the information “to develop and implement an information-security program that provides assurance over data confidentiality, integrity and availability,” according to the audit, released even though theschool is shifting instructional computers away from the oversight ofthe state’s information-technology agency.
Walter Kucharski, state auditor of public accounts, said that the report should merely serve as a warning.
“Is anybody stealing from them today, or has anything bad happened? No,” he said. “This is basically a cautionary tale to say, ‘You need to think about this stuff.’ “
The school received about $71 million for a massive construction effort in orderto consolidate the Hampton School with the Staunton school, but there were several lax accounting issues, the audit found.
For example, the school paid seven invoices that included travel expenses without support, and one invoice included overcharges for shipping fees. The superintendent also did not approve two of the construction invoices reviewed, and approved one of the architect and engineer invoices after it was paid.
School Superintendent Nancy C. Armstrong said staffers have corrected the errors.
Mr. Kucharski said the computer-security concerns are more about the school being so small, and less about institutional problems.
“If you lose one or two people, you could knock your IT department off, and they wouldnt know how to react, and the same thing is true with the accounting department,” he said.
Ms. Armstrong said the school is addressing that concern by implementing an information-security program that includes more cross-training,
“We’ve always done cross-training, internal controls,” she said. “Weve just stepped that up.”
The school is currently in the process of dumping many of its computers to relieve itself of oversight from the Virginia Information Technologies Agency (VITA), which oversees the information-technology structure for state agencies.
The schools annual bill from VITA totaled about $335,000, and so it has started the process of transferring instructional computers away from VITA oversight, while keeping administrative functions on the network.
“The school, because of the way it had been set up as a state agency, fell under the purview of VITA, and no other school of any type was falling under the purview of VITA,” said state Sen. Emmett W. Hanger Jr., Augusta Republican, who sits on the schools Board of Visitors.
The school still has 60 computers on campus until they can replace them with their own, a process that should be completed by Christmas, said Ms. Armstrong.
The defense giant Northrop Grumman runs the states data centers, help desks and other IT operations as part of a $2.3 billion contract — the largest single-payer contract in the history of Virginia state government. Last year, the state agreed to extend the 10-year contract by an additional three years and pay nearly $200 million more after state agencies and the company clashed over payments and the quality of services provided.
“I’m concerned that theyre a small agency starting out, and I want to get them started out on the right foot,” said Mr. Kucharski. “If you dont start doing this and something goes wrong, its going to go wrong very quickly.”
However, the school was not without complaints of its own. As part of a statewide effort, the state’s Payroll Services Bureau on Jan. 1, 2010, started processing certain payroll functions for the school. There have been a number of errors and issues during the first year, so the school still retains its own payroll staff, Ms. Armstrong wrote in response to the audit.
“When you’re talking about government services and money, it’s costing us double, which doesn’t quite seem efficient to me,” said Ms. Armstrong. “I thought it was a redundancy, and still think its a redundancy.”
But state Comptroller David A. Von Moll, while acknowledging issues with the school early on during the transition, said that overall, the new system is working well.
“We’re in routine communication with all of our customers,” he said. “Were operating under the assumption that things are going smoothly.”
“I’m pretty confident that they would like to go back to doing it on their own if they had their druthers,” he did add.