Review - S 2256 Introduced – CISA Cyber Training

Last month Sen Hassan (D,NH) introduced S 2256, the Federal Cybersecurity Workforce Expansion Act. It would require CISA to establish an apprenticeship program that would lead to cybersecurity related employment with CISA or other Federal entity. The bill would also require the Veterans Administration to establish a pilot program providing cyber-specific training for eligible individuals. There is no funding authorized in the legislation.

This bill is nearly identical to the reported version of S 2274 from the 117^th Congress. That bill was reported favorably by the Senate Homeland Security Committee, but no further action was taken.

Moving Forward

Hassan is a member of the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee to which this bill was assigned for consideration. She probably has enough influence to see this bill considered in Committee. I see nothing in the bill that would engender any specific opposition. I suspect that it would receive significant bipartisan support in committee. This bill would not be considered on the floor of the Senate under regular order, but it might make it into the DHS spending bill as an amendment.

Commentary

While this bill does not directly address control system security issues, increasing the cybersecurity qualified staffing of CISA is certainly of interest to the ICS security community. While the training programs established under this bill would be targeted at future CISA employment, they should result in a net increase to the nation’s cybersecurity workforce.

 

For more information about the two programs outlined in this legislation, see my article at CFSN Detailed Analysis - https://patrickcoyle.substack.com/p/s-2256-introduced - subscription required.