A rare point of seeming agreement in Washington: All four congressional homeland security leaders have given one of Obama’s recently-announced cybersecurity bills their approval, Politico reported.
Part of the White House’s proposal legally facilitates information sharing between private companies and the Department of Homeland Security when it comes to cyber threats—a provision lawmakers have long tried to work into cybersecurity bills, to the dismay of privacy experts.
“While it took an attack on Hollywood for the president to reengage Congress on cybersecurity, I welcome him to the conversation,” said Michael McCaul (R-Texas), House Homeland Security Committee chairman.
“I appreciate President Obama coming to Congress with a proposal on cybersecurity information sharing,” Senate Homeland Security Chairman Ron Johnson (R-Wisc.) said.
In the past, two separate bills have battled it out on this issue in Congress: the Cybersecurity Information Sharing Act (CISPA), which aids information sharing with the NSA, and another—McCaul’s National Cybersecurity and Critical Infrastructure Protection Act— which would give the responsibility to the Department of Homeland Security. The DHS proposal has been less controversial.
Information sharing, particularly in CISPA (or its Senate version, CISA) has been widely denounced by the privacy community, since it allows companies to share private user data with the government free of consequences.
The Electronic Frontier Foundation, a privacy group, noted in a statement this week that the Obama administration formerly opposed CISPA, but that in light of his new bill, “we’re concerned that the Administration proposal will unintentionally legitimize the approach taken by these dangerous bills.” EFF called on the White House to avoid “unnecessary computer security information sharing bills.”
Cybersecurity bills were particularly complicated by Congress’ failure to move forward on NSA reform. CISPA was recently reintroduced this year.
House Intelligence Committee Chairman Devin Nunes told Politico that information sharing will, indeed, be a priority for cooperating with the president on this matter.
“I’m hopeful that [Senate Intelligence Committee] Chairman Burr and I can see how last year’s bill compares with the president’s proposal and get a new bill introduced as soon as possible,” said Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.) Burr told MSNBC he and Feinstein will be “working aggressively” to pass cybersecurity measures.
