The National Defense Authorization Act includes pay increases for US soldiers, upgrades of equipment, and facilities to require more research before withdrawing troops from Germany or Afghanistan.
More than two dozen provisions in the NDAA are recommendations from the Cyberspace Solarium Commission, a bipartisan group of lawmakers and security experts created last year to devise and propose a strategy to strengthen the US against cyber-attacks.
It would take on a new role within the White House of “national cyber director,” a top priority of the committee, who would advise the president on all cyber matters, including policy, oversee the administration’s cyber strategy and coordinate federal response efforts.
The $ 740 billion bill, passed by the Senate and House earlier this month with veto-right majorities, would allocate more than $ 375 million to the Department of Energy to modernize the U.S. nuclear infrastructure and protect nuclear weapons stockpiles. cyber attacks. CNN reported that the Energy Department had detected malware related to the ongoing massive data breach, but said it had no impact on the agency’s essential national security functions.
The bill also works to depoliticise the Department of Homeland Security’s Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency by turning assistant directors into career personnel within the agency. It also creates a fixed five-year term for the relatively new role of CISA director, avoiding a situation like the one last month when Trump fired the most recent CISA director, Chris Krebs, for his assurance that the 2020 election will be safe. goods. Krebs, the first head of CISA, worked for about two years.
The NDAA would require the Department of Homeland Security to review CISA’s force structure and facilities to meet the growing expectations of its cyber arm. It would also grant the CISA warrant to subpoena, allowing the agency to find vulnerable systems and alert owners of public and private systems.
In the wake of the SolarWinds hack, both Rep. Mike Gallagher, a Wisconsin Republican and committee co-chair, and former Trump security adviser Tom Bossert, have pointed to the bill’s provision that would authorize DHS to act on federal networks.
In an interview for Defense One Thursday, Gallagher said the provision “would have put us in a position to detect and respond more quickly.”
“We need a federal government that is better able to track down intruders like this. And I think that’s why it’s so important to get some of these NDAA recommendations across the finish line,” said the congressman. Wisconsin.
And Bossert argued in a New York Times op-ed on Wednesday that the NDAA “needs to sign a piece of legislation and it won’t be Congress’s last move” before the fallout from the attack is resolved.
Trump, who has been publicly silent about the cyber-attack, has raised other issues in his threat to veto the NDAA, most notably the lack of a provision to revoke liability protections for internet companies, although he has in the past also has expressed dissatisfaction with efforts by Congress to rename military installations named after Confederate officials, which is also addressed in the legislation. The bill would also limit how much money Trump can move for his border wall. Trump has until Wednesday to veto or pass the measure into law.
However, in the wake of last week’s cyberattack, some Republicans and Democrats have pointed to the cybersecurity measures as another reason for Trump to sign the defense bill into law.
A group of Republicans on the House Armed Services Committee, including Gallagher, claim that “the measures in this year’s bill will provide critical safeguards to protect the information and capabilities most fundamental to the security of our country.”
“This attack serves as a clear warning that our country must strengthen its cyber security position and capabilities, and it must do so immediately,” six House Republicans said in a joint statement Thursday.
And independent Senator Angus King of Maine, the other chair of the Cyberspace Solarium Commission, urged Trump on Friday to pass the NDAA bill, emphasizing that “our protections against cyber-attacks are at stake in the coming days.”
“Mr. President, if you are listening, please sign. We need this protection. If we ever doubted it, we learned this week how serious this is,” said King in an interview with CNN’s Dana Bash Friday.
Zachary Cohen, Brian Fung, Geneva Sands, Alex Marquardt, Daniella Diaz, Ted Barrett, Jeremy Herb and Clare Foran contributed to this report.
