Outgoing President Joe Biden has moved to bolster U.S. cybersecurity with a last-minute executive order (EO) ahead of President-elect Donald Trump's inauguration on Monday, reports SiliconAngle.
Aside from subjecting government IT contractors to minimum cybersecurity standards, Biden's EO also broadens sanctions against foreign cyber adversaries, mandates new cryptographic standards for federal agencies, orders the development of AI-based tools for determining government network flaws, and requires government IoT vendors' Cyber Trust Mark compliance by Jan. 2027.
While Andrew Borene, executive director of global security at Flashpoint, said the EO was a significant move toward addressing increasingly-sophisticated Chinese, Russian, and North Korean cyber threats, Lorri Janssen-Anessi, director of external cyber assessments at BlueVoyant, took a wait-and-see approach.
"Given the critical nature of the threats and the fact that cyber incidents do not respect political boundaries, it's likely that the incoming administration will recognize the value in continuing to support and implement many of the EO's objectives," said Janssen-Anessi.
