Committee Hearings – Week of 06-11-17

This week with both the House and Senate in session the FY 2018 budget is still the big deal in congressional hearings. There are also three other hearings that may be of specific interest to readers of this blog; DHS authorization and cybersecurity

Budget

Because of having to deal with the FY 2017 spending bill earlier this year, Congress is behind in the budgeting/spending process. Hearings this week will be looking at the department budgets. These are high-level discussions of the President’s spending plan; don’t expect much in the way of details.

Hearings of potential interest to readers of this blog include:

• Monday, House, DOD, Armed Services Committee;

• Tuesday, Senate, DOD, Armed Services Committee;

• Wednesday, House, DOT, Appropriations Committee – Subcommittee;

• Wednesday, Senate, DOD, Appropriations Committee – Subcommittee;

• Thursday, House, DOD, Appropriations Committee – Subcommittee;

• Thursday, House, DOT, Appropriations Committee – Subcommittee;

• Thursday, House, EPA, Appropriations Committee – Subcommittee;

DHS Authorization

As I mentioned earlier today, the House Homeland Security Committee will be holding a markup hearing Wednesday on HR 2825, the FY 2018 DHS Authorization Act. There is already a link to the substitute language that the Committee will markup. I expect that we will see additional amendments posted to the site tomorrow afternoon.

Cybersecurity

There will be two cybersecurity related hearings this week. One will look at IOT opportunities and challenges and the other will look at WannaCry.

Tuesday the Digital Commerce and Consumer Protection Subcommittee of the House Energy and Commerce Committee will hold a hearing looking at “Disrupter Series: Update on IOT Opportunities and Challenges”. The witness list includes:

• Mark Bachman, Integra Devices

• Gary D. Butler, Camgian Microsystems Corporation

• Cameron Javdani, Louroe Electronics

• Peter B. Kosak, General Motors North America

• Bill Kuhns, Vermont Energy Control Systems LLC

• William S. Marras, the Spine Research Institute

On Thursday the Oversight Subcommittee and the Research and Technology Subcommittee of the House Science, Space, and Technology Committee will hold a joint hearing on “Bolstering the Government’s Cybersecurity: Lessons Learned from WannaCry”. The witness list includes:

• Salim Neino, Kryptos Logic

• Charles H. Romine, National Institute of Standards and Technology

• Hugh Thompson, Symantec

• Gregory J. Touhill, Carnegie Mellon University

Committee Hearings – Week of 06-04-17

With both the House and Senate back in Washington this week the main focus in Committee hearings will be the FY 2018 budget, but there will be some other hearings that will address cybersecurity issues.

Budget

Budget hearings are really high-level policy discussions with little or no details about program implementation, so there will be little here that will be of specific interest to readers of this blog. The only possible exception will be the DHS hearings because of their focus on cybersecurity.

The Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee will meet on Tuesday to look at the DHS budget request. The House Homeland Security Committee will hold their hearing on Wednesday. The written testimony from Secretary Kelly will be virtually identical for both hearings.

Again, with the high-level policy focus of this hearing there will probably be no mention of control system security.

Healthcare Cybersecurity

On Thursday, the Oversight and Investigations Subcommittee of the House Energy and Commerce Committee will be holding a hearing on “Examining the Role of the Department of Health and Human Services in Health Care Cybersecurity”. The witness list includes:

• Mr. Emery, Health Care Industry Cybersecurity Task Force

• Mr. Steve Curren, US Department of Health and Human Services

• Mr. Leo Scanlon, U.S. Department of Health and Human Services

With no direct testimony from the FDA, it is unlikely that there will be any substantive mention of medical device cybersecurity.

On Wednesday the Energy and Commerce Committee will be holding a markup hearing looking at a number of bills. Of specific potential interest here is HR 2430, the FDA Reauthorization Act of 2017. I have not specifically reported on this bill because there are no cybersecurity provisions in the bill as introduced. There is a remote chance that there could be some medical device cybersecurity provisions added in this markup.

Committee Hearings – Week of 05-21-17

With both the House and Senate in Washington this week the focus will start to be on the FY 2018 budget. Other topics will also be addressed in Congressional hearings including one cybersecurity hearing.

Potentially Interesting Budget Hearings

With the President’s FY 2018 budget heading to the Hill this week we will be starting to see a series of hearing on that budget request. Some of the hearings that may be of particular interest to readers of this blog include:

• US Cyber Command (House) – Tuesday;

• DOT (House) – Wednesday;

• DHS (House) – Wednesday;

• DOD (Senate) – Wednesday;

Cybersecurity

Okay, ‘cybersecurity’ will really be one of the (major) sub-texts of this hearing. On Tuesday the Cybersecurity Subcommittee of the Senate Armed Services Committee will be holding a hearing on ‘Cyber Posture of the Services’. The witness list includes:

• Vice Admiral Marshall B. Lytle III, USCG

• Vice Admiral Michael M. Gilday, USN

• Lieutenant General Paul M. Nakasone, USA

• Major General Christopher P. Weggeman, USAF

• Major General Loretta E. Reynolds, USMC

I expect that there will be passing references to WannaCry and perhaps some obscure references to industrial control system security issues.