Posted by Stephanie Simms.
Over the past decade or so, Congress has created multiple bills with regard to cybersecurity, but sadly made no progress whatsoever. In December 2014, lawmakers along with the President set aside disagreements over the topic of cybersecurity reform and passed the following into law: (1) National Cybersecurity Protection Act (NCPA); (2) Cybersecurity Enhancement Act of 2014 (CEA); (3) Federal Information System Modernization Act of 2014 (FISMA 2014); (4) Cybersecurity Workforce Assessment Act (CWWA); and (5) Border Patrol Agent Pay Reform Act (BPAPRA).
These bills mentioned above generally address federal government departments with respect to cybersecurity. FISMA 2014, is a revision of the Federal Information Security Management Act 0f 2002 (FISMA) and was meant to “provide a framework for the federal government to assess and ensure its information security controls.” The CWWA and BPAPRA handle cybersecurity workforce issues at the Department of Homeland Security (DHS). The NCPA focuses only on promoting “information sharing” between the government and the private sector via DHS. The CEA officially is a bill that is governed-focused, but of all the bills passed in December, “it is the one that may have the biggest chances of causing unintentional effects on private sector organizations.”
Stephanie is business administration with a minor in biology at Montclair State University, Class of 2017.