Cybersecurity Awareness Month Enters Final Week: CISA Theme 'Securing the Next 250' Adds Two Incident-Response Actions for 2026
WASHINGTON — October is Cybersecurity Awareness Month in the United States, and this year's campaign has entered its final week. The Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA), the federal lead for the campaign, set the 2026 theme as 'Securing the Next 250,' recognizing the nation's 250th anniversary and focusing on the government and private-sector organizations that support critical infrastructure.
The awareness month has been observed for more than 20 years. CISA's four essentials for organizations are to teach employees to avoid phishing scams, require strong passwords, require multifactor authentication, and update software promptly, with further steps including system logging, data backups, encryption and reporting cyber incidents to CISA.
Two new actions were added for 2026 under CISA's Cyber Performance Goals: organizations should have an incident response plan and exercise it regularly — with realistic drills covering scenarios such as ransomware and including leadership and legal counsel, reviewed at least annually — and be prepared for system disruptions, with plans to recover and restore critical assets, including the ability to shift to paper-based operations or radio communications if needed.
CISA has published a 2026 toolkit with posters, presentation templates and social media materials for organizations running their own campaigns. The awareness month ends on October 31.
Source: GSM · USA
Source: GSM · USA (original Chinese edition)
Photo: 图：网络安全与基础设施安全局（CISA）标志。图源：CISA，美国联邦政府公共领域。 / Logo of the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA), U.S. federal government, public domain.
