Cyberattacks increase after Sept. 11

Even as state and local governments plan how they will respond to future terrorist threats, the preparation process is hardly an academic exercise for many communities.

In Orlando, Fla., there has been a nearly 300-fold increase in cyberattacks, and most IP addresses show they're coming from the Middle East and Pakistan, said John Matelski, Orlando's deputy CIO, who advises the mayor.

Before Sept. 11, he said the city averaged about 50 intrusion attacks per month. After the attacks, the city has averaged about 14,000 per month.

"Many of these intrusion attempts are not volatile. They're merely probes to find deficiencies and perhaps do harm," Matelski said. "We're looking at using our software and trying to deploy similar ones regionally for some of the smaller and larger communities that may not have a robust system of detection."