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An Analysis of Proposed Federal Cybersecurity Legislation

By Todd Taylor
October 31, 2012

Michael Chertoff, the former head of the U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS), recently remarked that “cyber threats represent one of the most seriously disruptive challenges to national security since the onset of the nuclear age 60 years ago.” Mr. Chertoff may be on to something. In its April 2012 monthly monitoring report, DHS announced that various companies in the national gas pipeline industry were apparently being targeted by cyberattacks. Between October 2011 and February 2012, DHS claimed that there were 86 reported attacks on U.S. computer systems controlling U.S. critical infrastructure.

U.S. Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta recently referred to the “so-called Distributed Denial of Service attacks” that targeted large U.S. financial institutions recently. “These attacks delayed or disrupted services on customers websites,” Panetta said. “While this kind of tactic isn't new, the scale and speed with which it happened was unprecedented.” Those attacks against the private sector represent a “significant escalation of the cyber threat.”

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