My new initiative - Chief Information Technologist/Chief Online Community Director at Ready Rockaway - January 2009 Good day to you, I was asked by Ms. Zandra Myers, project coordinator of the Ready Rockaway organization, if I could join in helping to build out this new organization/initiative here in my hometown of Far Rockaway. As a community leader I was very enthused by this opportunity as I also work with Ms. Myers on the Far Rockaway Community Coalition Executive’s Team and have found her to be quite an intriguing lady with a serious desire to give something of value back to her community here. I saw this to be a very good synergy for the two organizations as they are both focused on the community and being involved in different ways. Bringing the two together for the greater good of the community is the ultimate goal. So, I accepted the offer and have started working on building out the technology aspects of the organization as you will see below. This is how I envisioned our technology professionals working within their communities to help build on initiatives like these and get something valuable and useful going there. Our yearly community outreach programs approached this from a technology point of view with the hope that organizations within the community would find value in having a specialist working within their midst to help them get over some of the issues they may have in building out their project plans and initiatives. This is just another way that TITSSN integrates into the process of community involvement and bringing the added values. I hope that we will continue to see more of these kinds of initiatives for our global network and i’d like to hear of them and where they are being done. Far Rockaway is a beach front community surrounded by the sea and across from the JFK airport. It is a beautiful place to sit back and watch the sunset or just gaze at the massive existence of the airport across the water day or night. A disaster can occur from any angle here and so this is a much needed initiative to save lives. I believe in being proactive than reactive and so here we go in the undertaking of this disaster/emergency preparedness initiative. Since this is what I do on a day to day basis, it pretty much marries into my scheme of things but adding the more physical side outside of IT to these issues. As a person who has developed and assisted in disaster recovery and planning for general businesses and organizations, I can use that knowledge to help build this community initiative to a higher level. Here’s a little about the organization and my role. The Ready Rockaway Disaster/Emergency Preparedness organization was formed to focus on the planning and development of an emergency response system for the Rockaway’s NY in the event of a disaster (natural or unnatural). The organization will create the needed training and development and disaster planning needed in the Far Rockaway community in an effort to scale out the needed sense of awareness to the possibility of a disaster and its effects. As with any such initiative, the support and input of the community is critical to its success and so we call on our community to join us as we build on this. We have made an extra effort to follow the growing communication trends of technology today and so we have a good presence on the social networking sites such as Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter, MySpace and others to come. My role is to use my technology background and expertise to create a converged network aggregating the needed education, awareness, alerting, monitoring and management of the technology and web infrastructure needed to make this effective. I will create the infrastructure to host this virtually and technologically while also training the team and community members on the technology behind the operations and how they will help to make this effort more user friendly and successful. I will be a liaison for the organization to address the strategic partnering and affiliations with outside technology organizations and companies in order for us to have the needed resources available to us. Our web infrastructure is up and the info’s are: Our website is http://readyrockaway.org. Our Blogs http://readyrockaway.org/blogs Our Forum http://readyrockaway.org/forum Follow us on Twitter here http://twitter.com/ReadyRockaway On Facebook http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=58417332634 LinkedIn http://www.linkedin.com/e/vgh/1853669/ MySpace http://groups.myspace.com/readyrockaway And more to come. Thank you and have a great day, ~Brett A. Scudder~ The IT Security Attaché ------------------------- Good day to you and welcome to my personal web infrastructure. Over the past 12 yrs I have been an advocate, liaison, community leader, professional (IT and non IT), technology advisor and voice for the promotion of more IT Security education and awareness across all levels of our infrastructure (people, processes and technology). It has been my belief that IT Security is not an industry problem but a people one as the impacts, issues and effects trickles down through very layer of our infrastructure and hits the core, the people and their lives. It is for this reason that I have been in the pursuit of fostering more educational and awareness programs and initiatives towards this effort which has awarded me the role of the IT Security Attaché. In this role my goal is to create new security enhanced, feature rich and motivational education and awareness programs/initiatives for all levels of our infrastructure so that we can be a more connected and secure minded global network as technology becomes a more integral part of our lives and the ways in which we live, work and play today and, for the future of tomorrow's converged network. As president/chairman and founder of The IT Security Suite Network this has become an integral part of who we are, our mission to the world and our promise of delivering this education and awareness across all levels. I have enacted specific programs and initiatives to focus specifically on providing more IT Security education and awareness in the lower and middle schools so that our youths growing up in this new technology age can be more aware and educated to the threats, risks and effects of this awesome resource the World Wide Web/Internet. Programs like our Secure Minds Initiative are specifically targeting the school systems to integrate IT Security as a part of their curriculum vitae and making this needed information and resources available to our youths. In making this dream come through I have been partnering/working with people across all industries, markets, cultures and geographies as IT Security is not specific to who, what, where and when and so we must treat it that way in order to properly contain and understand it. Our Adopt an Institution program was created to allow us to work more closely with selected schools and their technology departments to foster this specific focus on IT Security and the IT Security Threats Landscape and it impacts and effects. To compliment this initiative and added an additional layer of value, we also started the first industry specific IT Security Scholarship program which rewards those students whom we deem as serious about pursuing this role in the IT field with financial support/backing and rewards. This site will serve as my personal agenda, updates, work, mission, objectives and bio. It will host a more personal resource of me and my resources as I integrate the various organizations and programs I am involved in and enacting on this mission of IT Security education and awareness. I will be working on making it more structured to be the center of my world and you will be able to get access and information to the world of TITSSN. So why am I doing this? Well, this has been a mission for me for many years and I have been slowly developing, enhancing and building on it in various ways. I had to do this because there were so many gaps that needed to be filled in getting the message, education, awareness, support, services and needed resources and a way to aggregate them into one so that it can be channeled out in the right way across all people regardless of industry, company size/type/location/verticals in a way that was understandable to them. I have been asked to provide guidance, assistance, recommendations and support for individuals, businesses and others on security related issues/topics and so earned the titles of doctor, advocate, ambassador, savior, friend and resourceful. When one looks at the IT Security Threats Landscape they get a sense of wow as to how much information, variables, threats, impacts and effects that it comes with and then it becomes a daunting task of figuring out where one fits into the mix. A part of my day to day responsibility is looking at these threats, their impacts, preventative measures and the many variables they come with and what they affect, and be able to align them in the proper ways against their targets. It is easier for someone to call me with a situation and ask for guidance of some kind of feedback/input that for them to try and figure out or align these themselves. So I become a conduit for aggregating all the info and then channeling them to people as per their environment, situation or cause for concern. What makes me different from other professionals/leaders? Where many have failed, I have been able to master the challenges I have before me in delivering my security education and awareness initiatives. My biggest challenge however is time and being in various places at the same time. This is why I use the internet and its resources as my gateway and means of travel unless a physical presence is indeed necessary. The path of security education and awareness is one that requires an unbiased and open means of communications, collaboration and networking, as all are affected and must be guided and provided with the same information and resources across the board. Some security leaders/professionals create this barrier around them where they become unapproachable and discouraging to those who are in need of their guidance and support. This creates unnecessary challenges for them in delivering their initiatives as the target audience is driven away by their attitude and egotistical behavior. In my mission of promoting this education and awareness I have created free monthly events, workshops, open forums, training and development sessions to provide a one on one personal outreach for people. This personal outreach puts me as the security attaché in the direct path/presence and reach of anyone who is in need of guidance, support and mentoring. I was never one to push anyone away and I welcome all into the fold as we strive towards building a secure global network for our future and the generations to come. I look forward to an exciting and feature rich year in 2009 as I brace for an increase in my workload and integration with other organizations and entities. Thank you and have a great day, ~Brett A. Scudder~ The IT Security Attaché