Is Your IT Really Covered?
Take our quick checklist to find out where your department stands.
- ✓Strengthen cybersecurity and protect your data
- ✓Take IT off your volunteers’ plates so they can focus on the mission
- ✓Know it’s handled with 24/7 monitoring and fast response
Two Free Ways to Start
Find Out Where Your Department Stands
No cost, no obligation, and nothing to install. Start with whichever fits your schedule.
IT & Cybersecurity Checklist for Volunteer Fire Departments
The printed checklist, now interactive. Answer 37 plain-English questions about how your department handles technology and get a scored summary the moment you finish.
- ✓37 questions across 7 areas — ownership, passwords, email, backups, network, turnover, and support
- ✓About 8 minutes — works on a phone at the station
- ✓Instant risk score plus a ranked list of your biggest gaps
- ✓YES, NO, or NOT SURE — and “not sure” counts, because assuming isn’t knowing
- ✓Emailed to you so you can share it with your officers or board
No download required. Nothing to install.
We Protect Your Technology While You Protect the Community
10:00 AM Eastern
Presented by Kevin Grace, Northeast IS
A practical session on the cybersecurity risks facing volunteer fire departments — and what leadership can do about them without adding work to a volunteer’s plate.
- ✓Why departments get targeted — and what attackers actually go after
- ✓The access problem nobody talks about: members leave, access stays
- ✓What actually happens to a department hit by ransomware
- ✓Live Q&A — bring your department’s situation
Why This Matters
Your Department Didn’t Choose Its IT Setup. It Accumulated One.
In most volunteer departments, technology grew the same way: a member who was good with computers set things up, vendors added systems over the years, and officers changed. Nobody made a bad decision. But eventually nobody is completely sure who is responsible for what.
Members leave. Their access doesn’t.
Volunteer turnover is normal and constant. Without a written offboarding process, removing someone’s access depends on a person remembering — and it rarely happens. Former members holding live credentials is one of the most common and most preventable exposures in the fire service.
Shared logins hide who did what.
One password passed around the station is convenient right up until something goes wrong. Then there is no way to tell who was in the account, and one departure compromises access for everyone.
Having a backup isn’t the same as recovering.
Backups fail silently all the time, and modern ransomware deliberately goes after backup copies first. Most departments discover the gap the day they actually need to restore — the worst possible day to find out.
Nobody is watching between calls.
When IT depends on a volunteer’s availability, problems get noticed by the people they are already hurting. An intrusion can sit undetected for weeks — long enough to reach the records and the backups.
Forget your score for a moment. Ask yourself:
If something serious happened to our technology tomorrow, do I know exactly who would take responsibility for fixing it?
If the answer isn’t an immediate yes, that’s the first problem to solve. See Where Your Department Stands →
The Checklist
Seven Areas. Thirty-Seven Questions. One Honest Answer.
The checklist covers the areas where volunteer departments most often find gaps. You answer YES, NO, or NOT SURE — and “not sure” counts, because when you’re responsible for protecting the department, knowing something is covered matters more than assuming it is.
Talk To Us
Want a Second Set of Eyes?
Skip the checklist and just have a conversation. We’ll learn how your department handles technology today, point out what’s worth a closer look, and help you understand your next steps. No pressure, no jargon.
Prefer to call or email? (518) 688-2504 · kpgrace@northeast-is.com
Northeast IS supports IT and cybersecurity for small and mid-sized organizations across upstate New York and Vermont — including volunteer fire departments, municipalities, and school districts.