Earlier this month the House Appropriations Committee published
their marked-up version of HR 7667,
the Commerce, Justice, Science, and Related Agencies Appropriations Act, 2021
along with their Report
on the bill. There were no specific mentions of cybersecurity in the bill, but
the Report did include several cybersecurity mentions, only one addressed control
system security issues.
Industrial Control Systems
On page 24 of the Report the Committee discussed the
importance of NIST’s Scientific and Technical Research and Services work on
advanced manufacturing systems. They directed NIST “to prioritize
new STRS funds to achieve fundamental scientific
understanding of manufacturing processes and equipment and to enable new smart
manufacturing systems capabilities for high-priority metals-based additive
manufacturing, manufacturing robotics, and cybersecurity for industrial
control systems [emphasis added].”
Cyber Threats
On page 19 the Committee expressed their concerns about cybersecurity
issues around on-line data collection efforts in the 2020 Census. They directed
“the Census Bureau to prioritize cyber protections and high standards of data
differential privacy”.
On page 24 the Committee discussed threats to the ‘digital
economy’ and urged “NIST to address the rapidly emerging threats in this field
by furthering the development of new and needed cryptographic standards and
technologies”.
Cybersecurity Training
The report addressed a number of cybersecurity training
initiative, including:
• National Initiative for
Cybersecurity Education (pg 24),
• Cybersecurity Training for the Manufacturing
Extension Partnership (MEP) program (pg 26),
• CyberCorps (pg 137),
Moving Forward
This bill will be included in second FY 2021 spending
minibus, HR 7617. The House is currently scheduled to take up that minibus
tomorrow.
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