On the recordJuly 31, 2012
the bill pending before us is the Cybersecurity Act of 2012, as it is known, and for most people it is a term which they may have heard but may not fully understand. It was about 2 months ago that Members of the Senate, including the Presiding Officer, were invited to a classified briefing. It was a briefing that Senator Mikulski of Maryland asked for to explain what this was all about because we had been hearing over and over again from the defense establishment in America that the No. 1 threat to America's safety and security was no longer just terrorism; it was cyber security threats and terrorism. For most people, they are not quite sure they have seen any examples of it that could make a difference. So here is what we saw. They took us down to this classified room, closed the door, took away our BlackBerries and iPhones, and put them in a separate place--and I will explain why they did that in a moment-- they took us in the room and briefed us on an example, just a theory. What if? What if a subcontracting company that supplied a major public utility in a city such as New York had a problem and someone stole a laptop from one of the employees, and that theft went unnoticed or unreported for a number of days, and then the laptop either reappeared or did not, what could happen?…
