On April 16, 2018, the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) unveiled Version 1.1 of its widely known Cybersecurity Framework, which incorporates changes based on feedback collected through comments, questions, and workshops held in 2016 and 2017.
NIST Releases Internet of Things (IoT) Security Guidance
Late last year, the National Institute of Standards and Technology (“NIST”) released Special Publication 800-160 (the “Guidance”) on implementing security in Internet-of-Things (“IoT”) devices. The Guidance was released following several highly-publicized distributed denial-of-service (“DDoS”) attacks in 2016 and is intended to provide a framework for software engineers to better address security issues and to develop more defensible and survivable systems in a sustainable manner throughout the life cycle of these devices.
US Commission on Enhancing National Cybersecurity: Action Plan for the President-Elect
The US Commission on Enhancing National Cybersecurity, a nonpartisan group established by President Obama in early 2016, released its final report on December 1, 2016. The report provides an in-depth view of cybersecurity challenges facing the digital economy, and provides a roadmap for addressing those challenges. For some issues, the Commission recommends that the next presidential administration take action within its first 100 days in office. Here are the six “imperatives” discussed in the Commission’s report.
OCR issues guidance on HIPAA Security Rule compliance and mobile health apps
The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services Office for Civil Rights (OCR) recently published two guidance documents to aid organizations in complying with HIPAA.
White House presses for robust sharing of cyber-threat information
On February 13, 2015, President Obama spoke forcefully on cybersecurity threats at the Cybersecurity and Consumer Protection Summit, and signed an Executive Order designed to encourage the sharing of cyber-threat information through the formation of “hubs” – Information Sharing and Analysis Organizations (ISAOs).
The President observed that much of the United States’ critical infrastructure runs on networks connected to the Internet, resulting in vulnerabilities that foreign governments and criminals are probing every day. The President outlined four basic principles that should guide the efforts to combat cyber threats:
- A shared mission between the private sector and the government;
- Focus by private and public sectors on their unique strengths;
- Flexibility in the approach to cybersecurity; and
- Protection for the privacy and civil liberty of the American people.
The President called the protection against cyber-threats a shared mission because neither government nor the private sector can defend against cyber-attacks alone. While the government has many capabilities, it is neither appropriate nor possible for the government to secure the networks of the private sector. On the other hand, the private sector is at the cutting edge of technology, but does not always have the situational awareness, the ability to warn other companies in real time, or the capacity to coordinate a response across companies to a cyber-attack.