HB1290: Cybersecurity incident reporting mandate

As part of VRSA’s commitment to service, we are informing you of legislation that may impact your operations.

As previously announced, effective July 1HB1290 required “every public body to report to the Virginia Fusion Intelligence Center all known incidents that threaten the security of the Commonwealth’s data or communications or result in exposure of data protected by federal or state laws and all other incidents compromising the security of the public body’s information technology systems with the potential to cause major disruption to normal activities of the public body or other public bodies.”

On June 30, the Virginia IT Agency issued a press release on the new requirements.

HB1290 requires incidents to be reported within 24 hours.

The website where incidents should be reported went live yesterday at: https://www.reportcyber.virginia.gov/.

Public bodies may also report incidents by calling the Virginia Fusion Center at 804-674-2196 or 877-4VA-TIPS.

For VRSA members with Cyber coverage, please continue to report incidents to VRSA as soon as reasonably practicable.

For those unsure what types of incidents should be reported, the website offers guidance on this topic on their FAQs page.

Informational Sessions

VITA will be hosting two information sessions about the new incident reporting legislation and reporting page in July and August.

  • Thursday, July 28, 10 a.m., register here
  • Monday, Aug. 1, 2 p.m., register here

Representatives from VITA and the Virginia State Police will be available during each 30-minute sessions to answer questions.

VRSA staff actively participated in all four meetings of the Virginia State & Local Government Cybersecurity Partnering Workshops, and we continue to remain active in discussions relating to cybersecurity impacting VRSA members to advocate for their best interests.

VRSA Managing Director Marcus Hensel has presented at two Virginia State & Local Government Cybersecurity Partnering Workshops in the past and will present again at an upcoming workshop on July 26.

The event is open to state and local government administrators, IT and cybersecurity administrators, and more.

Registration is available online here.