U.S. House Intelligence Committee Approves Protecting Cyber Networks Act

On Thursday, March 26, the U.S. House Intelligence Committee unanimously approved the text of the Protecting Cyber Networks Act (H.R. 1560), two days after it had been introduced. The bill is similar, but not identical, to the Senate’s Cybersecurity Information Sharing Act of 2015 (“CISA”), which was passed by the Senate Intelligence Committee on March 18. It is intended to encourage voluntary sharing of cybersecurity threat information between and among private entities and the federal government.

Like the CISA, the House bill has measures intended to protect the civil liberties of individuals whose information may be captured in threat monitoring efforts, and provides liability protections for businesses and organizations that share cyber threat information. Unlike the Senate’s version, the House bill does not require that threat information be shared through a federal government clearing-house; information may be shared directly by companies or through industry-established information sharing and analysis centers.

Both bills are opposed by civil liberties organizations, such as the ACLU, the Electronic Frontier Foundation, and the Open Technology Institute, who say they create loopholes allowing private companies to share personal information with government intelligence agencies.