Better Treatment, Coordination of Telecom Service in Disasters Urged at FCBA Meeting
Communications should be treated as critical infrastructure and security access should be allowed during disasters and emergencies, citing lessons learned from disasters like the Haiti earthquake, speakers said during a Federal Communications Bar Association panel. Ken Moran, senior deputy chief of the FCC Public Safety and Homeland Security Bureau, identified the National Response Framework as the legal framework for all levels of domestic incident response.
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Government agencies should incorporate telecom providers into federal response policies and give them the proper credentialing to allow priority access into disaster sites, said CTIA Vice President Christopher Guttman-McCabe at the meeting, hosted by the FCBA Homeland Security and Emergency Communications Committee late Thursday. On a macro level, there isn’t a recognition that telecom is critical infrastructure, he said.
The National Response Framework’s coordinating structures are always in effect for implementation at any level and at any time for local, state and national emergency or disaster response, Moran said. The framework is being reviewed all the time for potential modifications, he said. The FCC, through partnership with Homeland Security, is involved in Emergency Support Function Two (ESF2), which is part of the framework, he said. ESF2 addresses cybersecurity issues that result from or occur in conjunction with incidents, Moran said. But “they are not that mature,” he acknowledged. “We don’t have that many operating procedures on what exactly we should do during a cyber event. … So it’s a work in progress,” he said. The FCC and other government agencies are looking at cybersecurity issues to better respond to cyber incidents, he said.
USTelecom Vice President Robert Mayer noted the role of National Security Telecommunications Advisory Committee, which makes recommendations to the President about assuring telecom links in a crisis, he said. Additionally, “we are very much involved right now in cybersecurity,” he said. Telecom carriers, content providers and vendors are working on existing cyber threats, he said. He noted the Department of Homeland Security’s close collaboration with the private sector on protection of critical infrastructure and cyber networks, including the current development of a National Cybersecurity Incident Response Plan. Cybersecurity crosses all boundaries so all players of the ecosystem have to work together, he said.