Read the Trump administration's draft of the executive order on cybersecurity

FWIW, here are 3 executive orders related to cybersecurity that President Obama signed:<p><a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;obamawhitehouse.archives.gov&#x2F;the-press-office&#x2F;2013&#x2F;02&#x2F;12&#x2F;executive-order-improving-critical-infrastructure-cybersecurity" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;obamawhitehouse.archives.gov&#x2F;the-press-office&#x2F;2013&#x2F;0...</a><p><a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;obamawhitehouse.archives.gov&#x2F;the-press-office&#x2F;2015&#x2F;02&#x2F;13&#x2F;executive-order-promoting-private-sector-cybersecurity-information-shari" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;obamawhitehouse.archives.gov&#x2F;the-press-office&#x2F;2015&#x2F;0...</a><p><a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;obamawhitehouse.archives.gov&#x2F;the-press-office&#x2F;2016&#x2F;02&#x2F;09&#x2F;executive-order-commission-enhancing-national-cybersecurity" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;obamawhitehouse.archives.gov&#x2F;the-press-office&#x2F;2016&#x2F;0...</a>

Not much interesting in there it seems. TL;DR: Let&#x27;s all review everything and decide on ways to improve things.

So far nothing controversial. Let&#x27;s hope he gets one thing right. Even a broken clock is right twice a day.

Is he demanding a review of government systems or of private systems as well? Like is the homeland security going to bring an army of security experts and start banging on Google&#x27;s doors demanding access to their servers to see if they are above board?

I think it&#x27;d be good for everyone to read these executive orders, rather than jumping to conclusions and acting hysterically.

That&#x27;s one heck of a wordy security audit request.

Some thoughts, sorry for the long quotes. Start with the second-to-last quote for what I personally find to be the most worrying.<p><pre><code> As a result of these changes, cyberSpace has emerged as a new domain of engagement, comparable in signi?cance to land, sea, air, and space, and its signi?cance will increase in the years ahead. </code></pre> This raises the possibility of hacking being treated as an act of war, and the resulting actions. I&#x27;m not sure if that&#x27;s the current status quo – I know there was discussion about it a few months ago.<p><pre><code> The term ?critical infrastructure? means systems and assets, whether physical or virtual, so vital to the United States that the incapacity or destruction of such systems would have a debilitating impact on security, national economic security, national public health or safety, or any combination of those matters. </code></pre> This does notably seem to exclude anything related to elections.<p><pre><code> The term ?national security system? means any telecommunications or information system Operated by the Federal Government or any contractor on its behalf, the function, operation, or use of which: [...] is critical to the direct fulfillment of military or intelligence missions (but does not include a system used for routine administrative and business applications, including payroll, finance, logistics, and personnel management applications). </code></pre> This seems to go out of its way to exclude &quot;personnel management applications&quot;, which is curious considering exactly such a system was at center of the second-largest hacking scandal involving the government last year.<p><pre><code> Review Participants. The Secretary of Defense shall co?chair the Vulnerabilities Review with the Secretary of Homeland Security, the Director of National Intelligence, the Assistant to the President for National Security Affairs, and the Assistant to the President for Homeland Security and Counterterrorism. </code></pre> The last three are Dan Coats, Michael Flynn, and Tom Bossert, respectively. It&#x27;s a bit heavy on the military brass and leans towards the political side to the exclusion of anybody with technical credentials (I&#x27;d think someone from the NSA or even the private sector could possibly be useful). But I&#x27;ve always been critical when, for example, judges have been accused to be inadequate to adjudicate technical issue – smart people can and will get the information they need to make right decisions. So let&#x27;s give them the benefit of the doubt.<p>Possibly relevant: it&#x27;s two cabinet members vs three people reporting directly to the president. I don&#x27;t know if these committees ever vote on anything, but that could be intentional to allow the President to keep full control over the direction of the investigation (Cabinet Secretaries being traditionally more independent than anyone in the West Wing)<p><pre><code> [..]the Secretary of Defense and Secretary of Homeland Security shall also gather and review information from the Department of Education regarding computer science, mathematics, and cyber security education from primary through higher education to understand the ?ll] scope of US. efforts to educate and train the workforce of the future. Th Secretary of Defense shall make recommendations as he sees ?t in order to best position the US. educational system to maintain its competitive advantage into the future. </code></pre> I feel a bit uneasy about Secretary of Defense being authorized to change the primary school curriculum, especially considering the basically limitless scope of &quot;maintain[ing] its competitive advantage into the future&quot;. It sounds like they want more math in school. But what if he concludes that the US has plenty of hackers, but they&#x27;re just not patriotic enough and rather work for Apple (which is actually somewhat true)?<p><pre><code> [A review shall find ways to incentivice private enterprises to] invest in cyber enterprise risk management tools and services; and adopt best practices with respect to processes and technologies necessary for the increased sharing of and response to real-time cyber threat information. </code></pre> This is once again pretty broad, but I thought it warrants inclusion because any sharing of data collected by private entities with government agencies has the potential to violate individuals&#x27; privacy.<p>Overall this isn&#x27;t really specific enough to scare me, yet. The bit about education is what most effectively raises my blood pressure, while the focus on military systems at the exclusion of anything election-related is somewhat curious.

The part about Department of Education ensuring a competent workfore doesn&#x27;t jive with haphazardly turning back permanent residents with PhDs and valid green card from reentering the country where they live. The US was made great when refugees from around the world were welcomed and then prospered for both themselves and the melting pot country. The rush to enact these sort of ignorant, brutal, arbitrary and uncivilized policy blunders further errode national security, the economy and international standing... also, the shitshow of a constitutional crisis is brewing where the various parts of government ignore the law and do whatever they want.

The real joke is that all this information is already out there. Infrastructure has already been evaluated. The the enemy is well understood. But you do have to read the reports. You have to trust those writing the reports. You have to not yell them out of the room when they say something that offends your reality. This order is a call for new reports written by new people with the skills necessary to explain cybersecurity to large children.<p>&quot;China bad. Big internet computer need antivirus.&quot;