One-Third of Feds Think Government is Less Secure Now Than One Year Ago

More than one-third of federal employees think the government is more vulnerable today than it was last year, according to a contractor study released this week.

By contrast, about one-fourth of federal government survey takers believe the government is more secure than last year, according to the report from the company Unisys, and 38 percent believe things are about the same.

The survey respondents were more sanguine about their own agencies, with 34 percent saying things are more secure, 25 percent saying their agencies are more vulnerable and 41 percent saying things are about the same.

When asked if they were confident in their agency’s ability to guard against information technology security threats, 32 percent of Defense Department respondents said they were “very confident,” while only 11 percent of civilian employees were similarly confident.

About two-thirds of combined defense and civilian respondents said they were “somewhat confident” and 13 percent said they were “not very confident.”

About 70 percent of respondents expected security threats against their agencies to significantly or moderately increase in the next year, the report found.

The survey was given online to 200 government respondents that were split roughly evenly between military and civilian.