Sitzblitz's List: Hurricane Sandy in Digital Citizenship

• Take one tablet & Google
  
  BYLINE: BY LISA L. COLANGELO NEW YORK DAILY NEWS
  

• The tablets are a big help to students who have no Internet access at home.

  Khadijah Rasheed of Far Rockaway said her borrowed tablet helped her "get the As and Bs that I got" to complete a degree from the College of New Rochelle.

• As Hurricane Sandy pounded the U.S. Atlantic coast on Monday night, knocking out electricity and Internet connections, millions of residents turned to Twitter as a part-newswire, part-911 hotline that hummed through the night even as some websites failed and swaths of Manhattan fell dark.
• T THE Queens Library you can get a good book - and a computer to go.

• Google tablets, once available only to library customers in neighborhoods damaged by Hurricane Sandy, will soon be featured in branches throughout the system.

  Anyone with a library card and identification can borrow the tablets, which provide Internet access with a Wi-Fi connection.
• At a keynote speech in Washington last month, former CIA director Leon E. Panetta warned that cyberspace is the "battlefield of the future." Hackers could trigger disruptions similar to those caused by Hurricane Sandy if they gain access to electricity grids, transportation systems or other networks, he said.
• “I had to recreate my tax-preparation data by hand from a hardcopy,” Singer said, recounting an entire summer spent recreating client’s tax returns. “I said, ‘I’m not going to let it happen again. ’”
• Warnings like Panetta's have created new opportunities for cybersecurity technology companies that once focused on computer networks. Many are looking to adapt their software to help protect other industries.
• So Singer did what many accountants who experience data disasters do: He headed for the cloud, utilizing software that stores financial information remotely. An entire army of accountants, in fact, has moved tax data from their desktops to secure websites, many after computer disasters.

• But even without Internet service, the tablets are preloaded with information on education, health, citizenship and computer skills training. They can also hold ebooks and emagazines.
• The firm works with telecommunications companies to make sure that the devices that make up "the Internet of things" - a web of connected devices and sensors - can easily exchange information over a network.
• And a few natural disasters, too: Hurricane Sandy, in particular, sent many New York accountants scurrying to the cloud for cover.

• The rollout started Friday at the Central Branch in Jamaica, where tablets are now available.

  "More and more people are using technology and the Internet to educate themselves or provide for their families - but not everyone can avail themselves of these vital tools," said William Floyd, head of external affairs at Google New York. "We believe that technology is a resource that should be made available to everyone."

  Queens Library CEO Thomas Galante and Floyd announced the expansion of the tablet-lending program during a brief ceremony.
• But a year after Twitter gained attention for its role in the rescue efforts in tsunami-stricken Japan, the network seemed to solidify its mainstream foothold as government agencies, news outlets and residents in need turned to it at the most critical hour.
• “When Hurricane Sandy hit, you lost access to your office, to your machines – but if you had a laptop, you could access the Internet,” noted David Bergstein, business development manager for Mountain View, Calif.-based accounting and tax software firm Intuit.
• Events like Sandy are “shifting people in New York and the Northeast,” Bergstein added, reminding professionals that copying data to disks and even maintaining hardcopies of critical materials may not be enough – and building an ever-stronger case for security through the cloud.
• As the storm battered New York Monday night, residents encountering clogged 911 dispatch lines and flooded the fire department's Twitter account with appeals for information and help for trapped relatives and friends.
• Last year, Google donated 17,000 tablets to the state to help people impacted by Sandy. The Queens Library received 5,000 of the devices, which were distributed to storm-damaged branches that needed Internet access.
• "Most [tech companies] are trying to bring in business solutions, most of which have started out doing either security capabilities or cybersecurity from a different industry perspective, and then looking at how it applies to the smart-grid space," said Patrick Gannon, the panel's executive directo
• One elderly resident needed rescue in a building in Manhattan Beach. Another user sent an In-stagram photo of four insulin shots that she needed refrigerated immediately. Yet another sought a portable generator for a friend on a ventilator living downtown.
• “Many clients lost systems and paperwork (to Sandy],” said James Bourke, a partner at Princeton, N.J.-based accounting firm WithumSmith+Brown who lectures on accounting technology. “It’s still in their minds. ”
• At the Red Cross of America's Washington headquarters, in a small room called the Digital Operations Center, six wall-mounted monitors display a stream of updates from Twitter and Facebook and a visual "heat map" of where posts seeking help are coming from. The heat map showed how the Red Cross's aid workers deployed their resources, said Wendy Harman, the Red Cross director of social strategy.
• “Accountants are beginning to realize that the cloud gives them more freedom and the ability to improve their workflow. ”
• Still, the Energy Department is actively searching for cybersecurity solutions for the electrical grid. In April, the department put out a research call for technology related to defending against moving targets, securing distributed energy resources that do not rely on a central power plant, and self-healing control systems for delivering energy.
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