After Sony and other businesses revealed that hackers had accessed critical data from their business, the U.S. Congress has done all they can to advocate for bills that would protect American businesses from threats to cybersecurity.
The House of Representatives recently passed the first of three bills designed to begin protecting businesses. "Passed 307-116, the Protecting Cyber Networks Act (PCNA), backed by House Intelligence Committee leaders, would give companies liability protections when sharing cyber threat data with government civilian agencies, such as the Treasury or Commerce Departments," The Hill reported.
House Intelligence Committee Chairman Devin Nunes (R-Calif.) told The Hill that the bill "will strengthen our digital defenses so that American consumers and businesses will not be put at the mercy of cyber criminals."
The three collective bills will act as a protective barrier for American businesses so that they don't have to worry about hackers or other cybersecurity threats. The White House has already approved two of the three bills and has also considered supporting legislation that the Senate has submitted to support this bill. Congress has been developing and considering cybersecurity bills like this for a long time, but it wasn't until after a recent set of hacks that Congress really began to work out the particulars of a set of security bills that would protect Americans' credit card data, Social Security numbers and other important information.
While this bill is yet another step towards providing cyber security protection, not everyone is supportive of these measures. "Privacy advocates and a group of mostly Democratic lawmakers worry the bill will simply shuttle more sensitive information to the National Security Agency (NSA), further empowering its surveillance authority. Many security experts agree, adding that they already have the data needed to study hackers' tactics," The Hill reported.
