Harris County, Georgia: Setting the Gold Standard for Local Government Cybersecurity with ThinkGard

Established in 1827, Harris County, Georgia has grown from its origins as a rural settlement into a vibrant community known for its scenic beauty, recreational amenities like Callaway Gardens and F.D. Roosevelt State Park, and economic growth in areas such as manufacturing, construction, and healthcare. Today, Harris County continues to balance its rural charm with forward-thinking leadership, making it a model for other counties in the region.

The Challenge: Lean Team, Many Demands

Like many counties of its size, Harris County faces a unique set of IT and cybersecurity challenges. With a population just under 37,000 and a modest budget, the county must protect sensitive data, maintain compliance, and ensure reliable technology services for government operations and residents.

Rapid growth in business and tourism, coupled with increasing cyber threats targeting local governments, means that Harris County must stay ahead of evolving risks. Limited internal IT resources and the need for scalable, affordable solutions further complicate the county’s ability to safeguard its infrastructure and effectively serve its residents.

Creating the Gold Standard of Cybersecurity for Local Governments in Georgia

Alex Santiago, Chief Information Officer at Harris County, describes himself as a working CIO. “I'm not the proverbial big chair guy. I'm in the field under desks pulling cable. I started the Harris County IT department eight years ago by myself and maintained it for a number of years without anyone else on staff. Even today with a team of three, I still need to be hands on.”

Starting from scratch, Santiago always had a vision to create the gold standard of cybersecurity amongst Georgia’s local governments—and he’s made this vision a reality through his leadership. With a managed service provider (MSP) background, Santiago did his due diligence researching different solutions—especially looking for scalability and affordability. He avoided the trap of picking the cheapest options—a strategy that often backfires on many local government IT leaders.

Instead, he thoroughly evaluated the needs of his existing environment, liability concerns, and risks versus rewards. Santiago says, “I'm not just bringing in solutions because they are shiny and new. I've done my homework. I know how solutions are going to work with my environment and why we need them.”

Santiago’s vision requires proactivity. He consistently takes steps to improve county operations and better serve residents. Because so many local governments are reactive, often reluctantly investing in IT and cybersecurity only after a disruption occurs, Santigo’s efforts have made Harris County a leading county when it comes to technology. With the increasing barrage of cyberattacks targeting local governments, Santiago is a rare county IT leader who had the foresight to take steps so that Harris County would not be caught off guard and unprepared for a cyberattack.

An essential part of Santiago’s gold standard vision involved a co-managed cybersecurity and BDR partner that augmented his team without the costs of hiring or adding lots of vendors. The co-managed partner he chose for such an important role was ThinkGard.

The Critical Importance of a Personal Relationship

When evaluating solutions, Santiago saw potential value in ThinkGard. Cautious through his MSP experience, Santiago took careful steps—starting out with ThinkGard’s BDR solution. After this worked well, he began to use ThinkGard’s endpoint detection and response (EDR) service. Over time, Santiago brought on different ThinkGard solutions, one piece at a time, as he built strong relationships and trust with the ThinkGard team.

“ThinkGard isn’t just impressive because of their technical expertise and value of their solutions,” says Santiago. “The most important aspect of our partnership is the personal relationship. ThinkGard doesn’t just sell me a solution and abandon me after the sale. They work with me, closely and ongoing, post-sale.”

Santiago also appreciates the refreshing candor that can only be forged through trust. “To succeed in IT, you've got to be forthcoming. With ThinkGard, it’s always a two-way street with our communications. We can be brutally honest with each other without hurt feelings. I consider ThinkGard’s team both as talented engineers and trusted co-workers with whom I can have fun as we also get important work accomplished.”

Critical Cybersecurity and BDR Solutions Implemented at Harris County

Over the years, Harris County has leveraged many of ThinkGard’s co-managed solutions to multiply the capacity of the Harris County IT department. Key solutions have included:

• Backup and Disaster Recovery: ThinkGard ensures that critical data is protected and recoverable in the event of an incident. Its enterprise-level BDR solution combines data backup, business continuity, and disaster recovery into a single platform—including immutable backups, rapid recovery, and specialized backups for Microsoft 365.
• Cybersecurity Services: ThinkGard provides EDR, email security, firewall management, internet content filtering, and other tools to create a holistic security posture for Harris County.
• Centralized Security Management: ThinkGard’s SIEM/SOAR solution provides the Harris County IT department with consolidated monitoring, real-time visibility into security events, automated incident response, and continuous monitoring.
• Compliance as a Service: ThinkGard provides full compliance visibility through a centralized dashboard, roadmapping, Governance Risk & Compliance (GRC), automated compliance tasks, documentation, and reporting.
• Firewall Consolidation: ThinkGard helped Santiago implement a single firewall solution with a unified management interface in order to reduce complexity, manage network security more efficiently, streamline administration, and improve scalability.
• Strategic Advising: Santiago continually collaborates with ThinkGard to plan, implement, and fine-tune solutions that align with Harris County’s vision for the gold standard in cybersecurity.

Proven Results That Keep Harris Country Secure and Operationally Efficient

Like any county IT leader, Santiago must prove that his investments pay off. It’s important to translate the technical to the non-technical for stakeholders. Santiago says, “I use a box of 64 crayons to manage my IT environment, but when I report to stakeholders I speak in terms of 4 crayons.” Santiago “decomputerizes” his reporting to eliminate unnecessary tech speak and focus on important results and metrics. Ultimately, as he tells county leadership, it’s his job to keep Harris County out of the newspaper when it relates to cybersecurity.

A critical part of Santiago’s reporting involves relating the results that ThinkGard delivers and the reports they provide. Since partnering with ThinkGard, Harris County has achieved significant improvements in its IT operations and cybersecurity posture that are very much worth relating to county leaders:

• Enhanced Security: By tying critical tools together into one holistic platform, ThinkGard offers Santiago greater visibility, eliminates the need to talk to many different vendors, and rapidly responds to incidents. As an example, the county once successfully mitigated a zero-day exploit targeting law enforcement email systems. The combined efforts of ThinkGard, the Harris County IT department, and the email vendor—along with ThinkGard’s email security tools already in place—prevented any chance of data exfiltration and minimized the overall impact.
• Improved Operational Efficiency: Centralized firewall management and security operations have allowed the Harris County IT department to focus on strategic initiatives rather than vendor coordination, saving time and resources. Once new firewalls were fully implemented and connections stabilized, Harris County achieved seamless site-to-site VPN integration across multiple locations. This replaced a fragmented setup where different tools managed different sites, which was inefficient. With the consolidated firewall solution, Santiago now has a single point of management that provides visibility into endpoints, antivirus status, and firewall configurations.
• Augmented Compliance and Documentation: ThinkGard’s compliance services have helped Harris County reaffirm the importance of maintaining proper documentation and meeting regulatory requirements, even as the Harris County IT department grows. This way, Santiago is able to stay ahead of state-mandated regulations around cybersecurity.
• Unique Teamwork and Support: The county’s partnership with ThinkGard is characterized by open, honest communication and a shared commitment to problem-solving. According to Santiago, “The ThinkGard engineers and sales team have an unusually tight relationship. Their teamwork amazes me. They walk the walk and own the work. Even when something is hard or we get stuck, they just keep working at it—continually giving me updates to let me know they haven’t forgot about me.”
• Expert Resources Always Available: Cybersecurity experts are always just a phone or Teams call away. And with ThinkGard augmenting the Harris County IT department, Santiago’s team members have the autonomy to grow in other areas because they know cybersecurity and BDR is covered.

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Harris County’s proactive approach and partnership with ThinkGard have indeed set a gold standard for cybersecurity across Georgia’s local governments. By investing in robust solutions and fostering a culture of collaboration, the county has not only protected its operations but also demonstrated leadership for other communities facing similar challenges.

The relationship between Harris County and ThinkGard exemplifies how co-managed cybersecurity and BDR services can empower local governments to reduce critical risks and serve their residents with confidence.