Greetings!
 
With the recent announcements from the Ministry of Education about back to school this fall, we want to let you know that ECNO is in your corner. We understand the speed at which decisions and execution need to be made and efficiency is needed more than ever to enable student success. ECNO is here to support all your hard work during this pandemic and help you help your boards have a successful school year. Despite the unknown territory many of us are walking into, our goal is the same: student success. If you and your board are in need of support please reach out to our Executive Director, Wayne Toms here.
 
As some boards move to more online centric models we have been working over the summer break to provide support and tools to keep networks secure and students learning safely. This month’s newsletter will give an update on our VASP project, some security tips for your board’s network and update you on current/future projects to support you.
Vetting of Application Security and Privacy Service
The OASBO Joint ICT-PIM Working Group has established and tested a process for conducting risk assessments on educational web applications. We are moving forward with our plans to conduct risk assessments centrally for the benefit of all boards. The outcome of each assessment includes a list of risk mitigation strategies that boards and schools can implement in order to use the application safely. Vetting will begin some time in September, please submit you software applications here.
Privacy and Security Developments
Getting ready for Cyber Security Month
As October approaches, ECNO and the ministry of education have been preparing for Cyber Security Month. Part of our work leading up to the month has been aligning boards for best practices and providing resources on ECNO.org. A resource we wanted to share for you and your peers was a great article on video conferencing guidelines for staff found here. This is a great starting point for staff who may have just started using video technology to reach students. To keep up or get a head start on Cyber Security Month for your board the federal government has resources as well found here. The first week is “taking stock” and we believe our VASP project will be a great resource to help you take stock on the safety of the apps you and your staff are using.

ECNO’s Security Corner – with Steve Payne, RISA for Eastern Ontario
Device Re-emergence
As our teachers, staff and students return to schools and offices the thing that should be first and foremost on our minds is their health and safety. For IT teams the second concern should be what have the devices they are bringing back into our buildings and onto our networks been in contact with and were any of them infected with malicious software while they were used outside of our IT protective bubble and controls. Especially for such a prolonged period of time. Adding a cyber security incident that may cause a service outage to the mix of an already complex school year startup is something none of us want.
 
Continuous Monitoring and Analytics helps us to detect anomalous behaviours, identify possible indicators of compromise and spot any deviation from baselines and expected trends.
 
Treat every device coming back to the network from home as a potential threat. Every anomalous device or user behaviour should be flagged and followed up on. Keep a closer eye than normal on your SIEM tool (if you are lucky enough to have one), O365/GSuite Security Centre and AAD alerts, your end point protection software, Firewall UTM/Security logs and Network Traffic Diagnostics and Monitoring solution such as SolarWinds for anything that may seem out of the normal especially during the first few weeks as we get back into the swing of things.
 
A good network design that allows for client isolation on wireless and wired networks using VLAN's and the presentation of only required services to user groups (i.e. There should be no reason for Students to be able to RDP into a SQL or Web Server in your data centre or SSH into a core switch or firewall) will help to mitigate any infection that makes its way onto the network. Users should cross a layer 3 boundary for inspection by IPS/IDS, Anti-malware as often as possible. Threat intelligence should be used on our edge SD-WAN devices to block outbound connections to known CNC servers and other malicious IP addresses.

Thank for reading and I hope this was all helpful. I wish you all the best and hope for smooth and consistent uptime for all your networks this coming school year.

Sincerely

Steve Payne, CISSP
Regional Information Security Analyst (Eastern Ontario)
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