President Obama on Wednesday announced the members of his federal commission on cybersecurity, just one day ahead of their first scheduled meeting in Washington.
Related Story: http://www.washingtonexaminer.com/article/2573014
The Commission on Enhancing National Cybersecurity, announced by the president in February, will be composed of prominent leaders from both the government and the private sector. Those will include former officials from Mastercard, Microsoft, Uber and Stanford University, according to a statement from the White House.
The most prominent appointee from the public side will be retired Gen. Keith Alexander, who led the NSA and U.S. Cyber Command under both Presidents George W. Bush and Obama.
The commission, part of President Obama’s $19 billion federal cybersecurity overhaul, is tasked with consulting cybersecurity experts and producing a plan before the end of the year to enhance the federal government’s cyberinfrastructure.
The effort comes after a year of the federal government was ravaged by cyberattacks, mostly from China and Russia. The Office of Personnel Management was hit by China, while the Joint Chiefs of Staff, the State Department, and the White House were all successfully penetrated in attacks linked to Russia.
Related Story: http://www.washingtonexaminer.com/article/2582848
In addition to Alexander, members of the commission will include Annie Anton, an official at the George Institute of Technology; Ajay Banga, president and CEO of MasterCard; Steven Chabinsky, general counsel to cybersecurity firm CrowdStrike; Patrick Gallagher, CEO of the University of Pittsburgh; Peter Lee, CVP of Microsoft Research; Herbert Lin, a cybersecurity researcher at Stanford; Heather Murren, a board of trustees member at John Hopkins University; Joe Sullivan, chief security officer at Uber; and Maggie Wilderotter, a former CEO of Frontier Communications.
The White House previously announced the commission would be co-chaired by Tom Donilon, a former national security advisor to Obama, and Sam Palmisano, formerly the CEO of IBM. Its first meeting will be hosted at the Department of Commerce by Secretary Penny Pritzker.
