House Cybersecurity Bill Would Establish Federal Overseer

[Shane S.]

http://www.westernjournalism.com/house-cybersecurity-bill-would-establish-federal-overseer/?utm_source=Western+Journalism&utm_campaign=4e23192b18-RSS_EMAIL_CAMPAIGN&utm_medium=email

Members of the House Homeland Security Committee introduced a cybersecurity bill on Thursday that would establish a quasi-governmental entity to oversee information-sharing with the private sector.

Like the other cybersecurity bills offered by the House GOP, the Promoting and Enhancing Cybersecurity and Information Sharing Effectiveness (PrECISE Act) encourages private firms to share information on cyber threats but stops short of mandating new security standards for sectors deemed critical to national security.

[David Mumme]

And that overseer would be Attorney General Eric Holder.

Giving this man control of the internet to shut down any

website that he decides is doing something wrong means

we are getting shut down.

These members of congress do not know what they are

doing here and they will even admit it.

[Shane S.]

David, what they refer to here is not control of the Internet, it is a Bill that would link DHS and other Government Agencies together with Public Sector Firms that work in the Cyber-security field. The Issue is that it makes their work more secretive with this Bill, gives DHS control of civilian cyber-security firms (at least in part) and allows for DHS to set the security standards.

[David Mumme]

I stand corrected......my bad. The bill I was thinking

of is SOPA. That one is coming up for a vote soon.

[Shane S.]

I would say that it is the one you are thinking of, but together they make for a power grab that could be yet more of a problem for us all.

[Shane S.]

Here is a link to some information about SOPA as referred to in comments.

http://techcrunch.com/2011/12/19/stanford-law-review-sopa-unconstit...

Stanford Law Review: SOPA Unconstitutional, Would Break The Internet

The Stanford Law Review has posted a concise and informed takedown of SOPA and PROTECT-IP, the bills currently creeping their way towards votes in their respective legislative bodies. They make many of the same objections I brought up in my article Kill Switch, but with fewer words and more authority.

The piece was authored by Mark Lemley, David S. Levine, and David G. Post — from Stanford, Elon, and Temple Universities respectively — and touches on a few finer legal matters, such as the acts’ nullification of due process and the questionable constitutionality of the whole thing.

It’s brief and worth a read, but here are a couple highlights: