Cybersecurity could affect federal bonuses

Cybersecurity Update – Tune in weekdays at 30 minutes past the hour for the latest cybersecurity news on The Federal Drive with Tom Temin and Jane Norris (6-10 a.m.) and The Daily Debrief with Chris Dorobek and Amy Morris (3-7 p.m.). Listen live at FederalNewsRadio.com or on the radio at 1500 and 820 AM in the Washington, D.C. metro area.

• Federal agencies could lose out on awards and bonuses, under a new cybersecurity bill. The measure introduced in the House Thursday would set up a National Cyberspace Office within the White House. The office would be led by a Senate-confirmed cyberspace director. Part of that person’s job would be to approve civilian agency IT security budgets. He or she could also recommend the president withhold awards and bonuses for agencies who’s budgets don’t go far enough in securing IT infrastructure. The bill is sponsored by Rhode Island Democrat Jim Langevin and Texas Republican Mike McCaul. And it’s one of 40 that address cybersecurity in some way.
• Half of the government’s chief information security officers believe they have a better handle on protection of federal networks this year than they did last year. That’s just one finding from the second annual CISO survey conducted by Cisco System and ISC2. Seventy five percent of CISOs believe they can balance the president’s Open Government Directive with the need for privacy and security. About the same percentage say they are avoiding cloud computing because of security concerns. CISOs also say their two biggest threats come from software vulnerabilities and insiders.
• The Securities and Exchange Commission and the Commodity Futures Trading Commission are investigating yesterday’s market meltdown. Roughly between 2:28 PM and 3:00 PM, the Dow Jones Industrial Average plunged hundreds of points, paused briefly just above the trading-suspension level, and then roared back. Senator Ted Kaufman (D-Del.) told CNN the market swing could have been caused by any one of twenty possible reasons… including a cyber attack.

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