Mark your calendars now for the Geographical Information System/Public Safety Answering Point (GIS/PSAP) Education Day! This no cost event is planned for Nov. 16, which coincides with National GIS Day. GIS and 911 are becoming more inter-reliant while not only providing lifesaving response to emergency incidents but valuable information for localities, regions and the commonwealth. This event is for GIS professionals, PSAP managers, telecommunicators, county and city managers, emergency responders, economic development, planners, etc. The event will be held at the Holiday Inn – Bristol Conference Center, Bristol VA. Please post the attached flyer in your offices and PSAPS so that each locality is aware of this opportunity. To register, please submit attendees name, agency, email & phone to swvagispsap@gmail.com by Nov. 1. Please include any dietary restrictions. 

2016 GIS Education Day flyer

Phones, computers and appliances all store vital information. Passwords are one of the first steps to protecting that information, but you can make login information more secure by pairing the password with another factor. You may have a smartphone, and you can prove you have the phone by reporting back the PIN code that was sent to it in a text message. You could also include your fingerprint or other biometric data. When two of these factors are combined to secure an account it is called two-factor authentication.

Learn more in this month's Information Security Tips!

VITA's Integrated Services Program (ISP) is hosting a webinar session on the recent statewide Geographic Information System/Master Street Address Guide/Automatic Location Identification (GIS/MSAG/ALI) analyses conducted by VITA. This session will be held on Wednesday, Sept. 28 at 2 p.m. The results are a product of the data uploads collected from the localities, in an effort to populate the GIS Clearinghouse with authoritative GIS data as we work toward Next Generation (NG) 9-1-1.

Learn more about ISP webinar series 

Governor Terry McAuliffe today announced the establishment of Virginia’s first registered cybersecurity apprenticeship, a partnership between Tidewater Community College (TCC) and Yorktown-based Peregrine Technical Solutions, LLC. In August, the Governor announced that students could apply for a $1 million state scholarship fund. Governor McAuliffe noted that Virginia alone has 17,000 cybersecurity job openings, and the field is among the fastest growing in the nation. 

Read the release