Cybersecurity legislation advances in Congress

The House Intelligence Committee on Thursday passed a cybersecurity data-sharing bill after making changes aimed at addressing privacy concerns raised by the White House and civil liberties groups.
White House spokeswoman Caitlin Hayden said Friday that the White House was reviewing the new bill to see if it addressed their concerns.
Advocates are optimistic that the bill, which has strong industry support, will pass given the urgency of the cyber threat and the stated intention of House Speaker John Boehner to move cybersecurity legislation this session of Congress.
The legislation, cosponsored by the intel panel’s chairman, Mike Rogers (R-Mich.), and its ranking Democrat, Dutch Ruppersberger (Md.), seeks to foster the exchange of online cyber threat data between the private sector and the government, as well as among private sector entities.
But the White House and civil liberties advocates have previously said the bill jeopardized Americans’ privacy. The administration also raised concerns that antitrust and liability protections would limit efforts to hold companies accountable for failure to boost computer network defense.
In response to the privacy concerns, the committee amended the bill so that the U.S. government could use or comb through data shared by companies only if “at least one significant purpose” is for cybersecurity or national security.

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