Public Confidence in Education Institutions' Business Continuity and Disaster Recovery Capabilities Up in 2008

Public confidence in the abilities of the nations' education institutions to continue in operation during major emergencies and recover from disasters jumped in 2008. This finding came from a 2008 opinion survey released today by InfoSENTRY Services Inc., a national information technology consulting firm located in Raleigh, N.C.

 "While overall confidence in major U.S. institutions' abilities to prepare for disasters and continue operation after disasters remained broadly low," said company President M. Glenn Newkirk, "education institutions have seen a rise in overall public confidence in their abilities from a Net Score of 28 percent in 2006, to 29 percent in 2007, and to 37 percent in 2008. This jump was a statistically significant increase of nine points in our net confidence ratings. Overall, in our 2008 survey, education institutions' confidence scores remained lower than scores for hospitals and medical clinics, banks and financial institutions, and local governments, but higher than scores for large corporations, state governments, and the Federal government.

"The increase from a Net Score of 29 percent in 2007 to 37 percent in 2008 for the continuity and recovery capabilities was a result of the "positive" scores showing slight, statistically significant increases and the "negative" scores also showing statistically significant improvement. The data showed very few consistent, statistically significant variations across gender, income, household size or number of children in the household.

Newkirk believes that the reason for the overall increase in confidence in education institutions' continuity and capability capabilities lies partially in the aftermath of both Hurricane Katrina and the Virginia Tech slayings. He stated, "After two very different tragedies that occurred within two years of each other, it is likely that people believe that schools and universities have taken steps to improve their ability to continue operations and recovery quickly in the face of such disasters. They hear about steps taken to return schools and colleges to operation in the Gulf Coast. They read how Virginia Tech has moved ahead and put new emergency plans in place. They hear from their own students and in their own communities about the changes that have occurred in education institutions in the past two years. That news simply has not spread with equal rapidity and evenness throughout all regions."

Information Security and Accuracy

The survey results for confidence in information security and accuracy in education institutions paint a somewhat different picture than do the data for confidence in education institutions' continuity and recovery capabilities. Newkirk noted, "In terms of overall ranking of Net Scores for confidence in information security, education institutions' scores of 32 percent, 29 percent, and 31 percent in the three measurement years still place them behind banks, financial institutions, hospitals, and medical clinics. However, they are ahead of large corporations and all other levels of government. That's the good news. The bad news is that the scores are statistically unchanged over the three surveys, showing no overall improvement. This statistical consistency was the case with all institutions covered in our surveys."

Newkirk continued, "It is likely that the lack of overall improvement in confidence in information security at schools and colleges and the variation among the regions were both tied to media reports of data breaches, losses, and thefts at institutions over the past couple of years ..." There were also widely reported breaches of public school information systems by students just playing around or trying to change grades."

In conclusion, Newkirk stated, "Regardless of their veracity or severity, these reports will continue to weigh on public confidence in colleges' and universities' information security and accuracy. There are only two steps that education institutions can take to improve public confidence in their information security capabilities:

• They can make real improvements in their information security capabilities
  
• They can carry out awareness activities in their communities.