President Obama ramped up pressure on lawmakers Monday to support new consumer protections following a series of high-profile cyberattacks, urging Congress ahead of his State of the Union address to support “basic baseline protections.”
Obama’s latest cybersecurity push comes after data breaches at Home Depot, Target and Sony Pictures Entertainment, with the attack on the movie company serving as the highest-profile example yet of vulnerabilities at major American companies.
“We pioneered the Internet, but we also pioneered the Bill of Rights,” Obama said in remarks at the offices of the Federal Trade Commission.
“We’ve got to all be working together in the same direction,” he added, addressing tensions between the federal government and private companies on the cyber reforms.
The president is proposing two new pieces of legislation, one that would require companies to notify customers within 30 days if their personal information had been exposed during a data breach and another that would prohibit the selling of student data to third parties for non-education purposes.
“Right now, almost every state has a different law on this, and it’s confusing for consumers,” Obama said. “Sometimes folks don’t even find out their credit card has been stolen until they see charges on their bill – and then it’s too late.”
Republicans have expressed a willingness to work with the White House on cybersecurity, but both sides must overcome privacy concerns cited by business groups.
Obama also would like to secure passage of a long-stalled consumer bill of rights, something that critics say the administration ignored in recent years.
“We believe there ought to be some basic baseline protections across industries,” the president said. “I hope Congress joins us to make the consumer privacy bill of rights the law of the land.”
