The White House is considering an executive order to secure the nation’s...
The White House is considering an executive order to secure the nation’s critical infrastructure, confirmed John Brennan, assistant to the president for homeland security and counterterrorism. The news came in a letter to Senate Commerce Committee Chairman Jay Rockefeller, D-W.Va.,…
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that was published late last week. Brennan said the White House is “exploring an executive order to direct executive branch departments and agencies to secure the nation’s critical infrastructure by working with the private sector.” Brennan said such an order would give core critical infrastructure companies the flexibility to decide how to upgrade their security with marketplace products and services while companies that already meet cybersecurity best practices would not be expected to do anything further. Brennan said comprehensive cybersecurity legislation is still needed to “improve the nation’s core critical infrastructure, to facilitate cyber information sharing between the government and the private sector, to strengthen and clarify the existing patchwork of authorities regarding federal network security, and to protect the privacy and civil liberties of the American people.” Senate Commerce Committee Ranking Member Kay Bailey Hutchison, R-Texas, said Monday in a CNBC interview that she opposed the president’s “heavy regulatory” proposal (http://xrl.us/bnp6ne). Hutchison, a sponsor of the SECURE IT Act (S-2151), said industry and government must have a cyberthreat information-sharing relationship “because it is the companies at the ground level who are getting the cyberthreats, and if they have a reporting relationship that is voluntary, and they have liability protections, we will have a much safer system.” On the other hand the White House is proposing a “heavy regulatory environment where [President Barack Obama] is going to tell the companies that they consider critical infrastructure to go through the lens of the Department of Homeland Security. ... We're trying to stop the heavy-handed regulatory regime that President Obama and the bill that is being pushed by President Obama [S-3414] would produce.”