President calls for federal action to improve U.S. cybersecurity

President Biden yesterday directed federal agencies to take certain actions to remove barriers to sharing cyber threat information with the private sector, enhance security in the software supply chain and better detect cyber incidents on federal networks. The executive order also creates a federal board to review the nation’s response to significant cyber incidents and recommend improvements, and a standardized playbook for federal agencies responding to cyber incidents.  

“Recent cybersecurity incidents such as SolarWinds, Microsoft Exchange, and the Colonial Pipeline incident are a sobering reminder that U.S. public and private sector entities increasingly face sophisticated malicious cyber activity from both nation-state actors and cyber criminals,” the administration said. “These incidents share commonalities, including insufficient cybersecurity defenses that leave public and private sector entities more vulnerable to incidents.”