cybersecurity, President Obama, past proposals

The latest cybersecurity plan was recently announced by President Obama, but critics say that the leader of the USA is simply revamping past proposals which have failed or been highly controversial. The two biggest components so far seem to be information sharing and notification when breaches occur. Both of these proposed solutions have come up in the past and been dismissed for a number of reasons. Right now there is no national data breach notification law, and each state has their own laws on the books. This has led to a patchwork and companies may become confused about what laws apply to them, especially if a company operates in more than one state. The second controversial plan by President Obama would resurrect a cybersecurity bill from 2011 that was very controversial from the state.

The 2011 cybersecurity bill which is one of the past proposals that President Obama wants to revive has been dismissed by critics because it poses a serious threat to the privacy of Americans. Neither of the past proposals ever made it through Congress, and it is highly doubtful that either plan will make it through this time around either. The ideals and philosophies behind both of the plans are good, but few trust the US government when it comes to collecting or storing information after all of the spying on US citizens that has happened by government agencies in recent years. Since Edward Snowden revealed a number of secret programs and helped the public realize just how much information the government already collects even lawmakers have been wary.