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This Week in Tech: House to revive battle on cybersecurity
The House Intelligence Committee will return to its work on cybersecurity this week as it prepares to re-introduce an information-sharing bill from last session and hold a hearing on cyber threats facing the United States.
House Intelligence Committee Chairman Mike Rogers (R-Mich.) and ranking member Rep. Dutch Ruppersberger (D-Md.) plan to re-introduce on Wednesday a controversial cybersecurity bill that has faced pushback from the White House. The bill to be introduced this week will be similar to the version that passed the House last spring.
The two Intelligence Committee leaders will formally re-introduce the bill during a speech at the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington. On Thursday, the committee will hold a hearing to discuss cyber threats facing the U.S. and current efforts to counter those threats. It will also review the state of information-sharing between the government and industry on cyber threats, as well as information-sharing among companies.
The White House shared those concerns about the effect CISPA would have on people’s privacy rights and issued a veto threat against it. It’s unclear how the White House will respond when the bill is re-introduced on Wednesday.
The Obama administration is widely expected to issue its cybersecurity executive order in the days following President Obama’s State of the Union address on Tuesday. It’s also expected to be released before RSA’s annual cybersecurity conference at the end of the month, according to two people familiar with the administration's thinking.
In the president’s address last year, Obama made a brief mention about the cybersecurity legislative blueprint that his administration put forward in May 2011. Some are expecting that he will make another reference to the need for improved cybersecurity defenses this year.
Others will be keeping an eye on the president’s comments regarding immigration reform this year. In his address last year, the president called for high-skilled immigration reform and for Congress to ease regulations that prevent entrepreneurs from securing financing for their startups.
On Wednesday the Senate Judiciary Committee will hold its first hearing of the year on comprehensive immigration reform. Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano is scheduled to testify.
In addition, the House Energy and Commerce Committees’ Communications and Technology subcommittee will hold a hearing on Wednesday morning to examine satellite television regulation. The law granting satellite providers the right to retransmit broadcast TV signals is scheduled to expire in December 2014.
The hearing will be the first in a series discussing whether to reauthorize or revise the law.
On Thursday, CompTIA is holding a trio of policy panels that will cover cybersecurity, the FirstNet nationwide network and the Startup Act 2.0, scheduled to be introduced next week by Sen. Jerry Moran (R-Kan.).
Chris Dodd, chairman and CEO of the Motion Picture Association of America, will discuss the challenges facing the film and television industry in a speech on Friday at the National Press Club.
One week before the Oscars, Dodd will discuss how innovations are changing his industry and the importance of films to the national economy.
The MPAA, along with its allies in the recording industry, aggressively lobbied for the Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA) during the last session of Congress. But a massive Web protest led Congress to drop the legislation, and lawmakers are now reluctant to touch the issue.
Dodd could discuss his organization’s plans for protecting copyright owners in the wake of the resounding defeat of the anti-piracy bill.
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