State and local government agencies are stepping up their IT modernization efforts in order to streamline operations, cut costs and make critical services and programs accessible to their constituents. But there is still much work to be done.

Only 13 percent of state and local agencies have made substantial investments in modernizing operations, according to a new survey from the Center for Digital Government (CDG). However, 56 percent said they are planning to upgrade their technology systems over the next two years in order to meet their communities’ rising expectations for digital access.

Enforcement of the California Consumer Privacy Act (CCPA) began as scheduled on July 1. Any organization covered by the law could be fined up to $7,500 per data record for failure to comply. What’s more, the CCPA allows individual consumers to file lawsuits against businesses for data breaches if the state attorney general declines to prosecute the case.

Shadow IT is a growing threat, largely because organizations vastly underestimate the size and scope of the issue. According to one Cisco study, large organizations use an average of more than 1,200 different cloud-based applications and services — more than 13 times the number recognized by their IT departments.

The European Union’s General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) went into effect in May. Although it is widely considered to be among the most strict data privacy laws ever enacted, few organizations have made proper preparations. Ninety-three percent of global organizations surveyed in April by the business analytics company SAS said they are not yet fully GDPR compliant.

A recent report from Kaspersky paints a grim picture of the state of cybercrime. Two global ransomware attacks, WannaCry and Petya, were carried out in the first half of 2017. Overall, the number of ransomware attacks increased 11.4 percent in the past 12 months.

Nationwide Insurance just agreed to pay $5.5 million as part of a settlement following a major data breach. UCLA recently warned 30,000 current and former students that their personal data may have been compromised. HBO is investigating a breach in which hackers accessed unreleased episodes of upcoming shows.