Cyber Security Laws and their Implications

Key Highlights

• The underlying objective of this piece of legislation is to ensure the improvement of cybersecurity in the United States through improved sharing of information that relates to cybersecurity threats among other purposes.
• This piece of legislation allows the process of sharing internet traffic data between the government of the US as well as technology and manufacturing firms.
• hrough CISA and any other cybersecurity laws, companies and organizations have been forced to protect their systems and data from cyber-attacks like viruses, phishing, trojan horses, denial of service (DOS) attacks, stealing of intellectual property, control system attacks and unauthorized access.
• Generally, sharing of National Intelligence data that relates to threats among private and public firms is an issue that should perhaps be given a second thought.
  

Cybersecurity Information Sharing Act (CISA) is a bill that resulted in the enacted of this law was introduced in the Senate of the United States on July 10, 2014, and later passed into law by the Senate on October 27, 2015. The underlying objective of this piece of legislation is to ensure the improvement of cybersecurity in the United States through improved sharing of information that relates to cybersecurity threats among other purposes. In this regard, this piece of legislation allows the process of sharing internet traffic data between the government of the US as well as technology and manufacturing firms.

Like all other cybersecurity laws, CISA has had a lot of social implications on the US population and beyond. The development of e-commerce and information technology in the US has equivalently grown with cybercrimes, resulting in huge losses for the government and the general population. As a result, the development of cybersecurity laws and relations to some extent has helped partly address breaches in these fields. Through CISA and any other cybersecurity laws, companies and organizations have been forced to protect their systems and data from cyber-attacks like viruses, phishing, trojan horses, denial of service (DOS) attacks, stealing of intellectual property, control system attacks and unauthorized access.

However, the introduction of CISA has been met with some level of criticism, with critics of the law questioning its value based on the fact that most private businesses have the common belief that it will shift the responsibility of securing private data from them to the government, thus increasing the levels of vulnerability of private information. Further, the private firms believe that their private personal information such as business secrets and intelligence sharing across various government agencies such as the local police and NSA could badly expose them in the event of successful cyber-attacks. Generally, sharing of National Intelligence data that relates to threats among private and public firms is an issue that should perhaps be given a second thought.