By Tom LeithauserThe increase in cyber attacks enabled by AI (artificial intelligence) has made it more urgent for Congress to reauthorize a 2015 law at the core of U.S. cyber defenses, according to 35 business groups representing telecom, technology, financial services, health care, and other critical infrastructure sectors.In a letter sent Sunday, the business coalition asked the chairmen and ranking members of the House and Senate Armed Services committees to retain a provision in the House version of the fiscal year 2027 National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) that would reauthorize the Cybersecurity Information Sharing Act of 2015 (CISA 2015) through 2035. The law is due to sunset on Dec. 11.“Over the past decade, CISA 2015 has become a foundational component of the nation’s cybersecurity. The law enables the voluntary sharing of cyber threat indicators and defensive measures between private entities and with the federal government, while providing the liability protections and legal certainty needed to encourage such sharing,” the groups said.“These authorities support the timely exchange of actionable threat intelligence and are central to the collective defense of public- and private-sector networks, particularly across critical infrastructure sectors,” they noted.“The case for a long-term reauthorization has only grown more urgent. Recent incidents have demonstrated that advanced AI systems can identify and exploit software vulnerabilities at machine speed, collapsing the window between the discovery of a weakness and its use in an attack,” the groups told the Armed Services leaders.“AI tools are also making sophisticated cyber capabilities cheaper, faster and easier to use, allowing threats to spread and adapt in real time. In this environment, the speed and breadth with which defenders share information determines whether they keep pace with adversaries. That speed depends on the legal certainty CISA 2015 provides,” they added.They urged the lawmakers to ensure that the provision in the House-passed NDAA survives when House and Senate negotiators meet to reconcile differences in the chambers’ respective versions of the bill.“As you work to reconcile the House and Senate versions of the Fiscal Year 2027 National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA), we urge you to retain this provision in the final conference agreement. In an era of increasingly sophisticated AI-enabled cyber threats, it is more important than ever for the private sector and the government to quickly and securely share information about cyber threats and defenses,” they said.The House passed its version of the NDAA (HR 8800) over the summer (CPR, July 23). CISA 2015 reauthorization was not included in the Senate’s NDAA (S 4784), which cleared the Senate Armed Services Committee in June but later stalled on the Senate floor. Congress has managed to pass NDAAs annually since 1961.The letter to the Armed Services leaders was signed by, among others, CTIA, the Information Technology Industry Council, NCTA, TechNet, and USTelecom.MainStory: TopStory FederalLegislation DataSecurity
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