Governmental agencies are now third on the list of institutions most likely to suffer a cyber attack on their technology systems.
For that reason, city of Aurora officials are looking at spending $47,237 to buy security software for the Information Technology Division as soon as possible.
Members of the Aurora City Council Finance Committee Tuesday recommended the purchase, which the city would make through the National Intergovernmental Purchasing Alliance Technology Solutions contract.
Ted Beck, Aurora’s IT security officer, said using the alliance would “broaden the group” of companies which the city would deal with in buying the software.
“The cooperative has done the heavy lifting,” said Alex Alexandrou, Aurora’s chief management officer. “When dealing with security, we want to be as quick as we can.”
But doing it through the cooperative means the city did not seek bids for the purchase, which it does not have to do because the software could be seen as a professional service.
Still, some city officials and aldermen have been sensitive recently about the city not getting bids on some professional contracts.
Ald. Robert O’Connor, at large, Finance Committee chairman, said officials have to be able to state “clearly” why they did not seek bids.
“There are factors that make a whole lot of sense to go with the cooperative,” O’Connor said.
Finance Director Martin Lyons pointed out that the IT department “heavily” studies the contracts for software. Beck said the city did call the references they had for CDW Government, of Vernon Hills, the company that would provide the software.
Beck said the city would not specify publicly exactly what kind of software is in the contract for security reasons.
