I just read up on this and wrote to my senator Snowe, a cosponsor. Feel free to do the same and creatively plagiarize as needed. I wrote:
I have read that you are a cosponsor of s773 regarding cybersecurity. I am a constituent who has consistently voted for you. My small business, Midcoast Internet Solutions is a Internet service provider on the coast of Maine which provides Internet infrastructure that is likely critical to some purposes covered in the bill. I applaud the idea of the US government improving it's cybersecurity, having a vision for cyber security, mapping critical infrastructure, securing DNS, and improving it's defenses and understanding of the task. I can not back a bill supporting some of the goals of section 18, which include shutting down non-government networks. I do not favor this intrusion into business or Internet operations. Furthermore, there is a good possibility that shutting down a network will not stop the potential problem due to redundant paths and routing systems that companies like mine use to prevent being affected by upstream outages or for performance reasons. Also, the identity management and national licensing for network providers is also unacceptable. Knowing who provides network security service for the federal government is fine, but needing those licensing and/or identity qualifications for the networks is going too far and does not sensibly correlate with business, Internet, and government standards for secure network use. When someone uses a network like the Internet for secure purposes (such as a normal credit card payment or something super classified) security software/equipment at each end of the transaction encrypts the data in a way that can be only decrypted at the other end. This is done so that it can safely pass through ANY network without regard to the security practices of the network paths it takes. This is not something special. Regular people, businesses, and government organizations utilize systems like this for theoretically all private communications between sites if it involves the Internet. Thus imposing national licensing and/or identity management on network operators would serve no practical purpose, hurt small businesses, decrease the available workforce for this growing industry, and create a barrier of entry to new businesses to provide network infrastructure. On Fri, Aug 28, 2009 at 12:47:14PM -0500, St. Louis Broadband wrote: > "The new version would allow the president to "declare a cybersecurity > emergency" relating to "non-governmental" computer networks and do what's > necessary to respond to the threat. Other sections of the proposal include a > federal certification program for "cybersecurity professionals," and a > requirement that certain computer systems and networks in the private sector > be managed by people who have been awarded that license." > > http://news.cnet.com/8301-13578_3-10320096-38.html > > > Victoria Proffer > www.StLouisBroadband.com > 314-974-5600 > > > > > > > > -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- > WISPA Wants You! Join today! > http://signup.wispa.org/ > -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- > > WISPA Wireless List: wireless@wispa.org > > Subscribe/Unsubscribe: > http://lists.wispa.org/mailman/listinfo/wireless > > Archives: http://lists.wispa.org/pipermail/wireless/ -- /* Jason Philbrook | Midcoast Internet Solutions - Wireless and DSL KB1IOJ | Broadband Internet Access, Dialup, and Hosting http://f64.nu/ | for Midcoast Maine http://www.midcoast.com/ */ -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- WISPA Wants You! Join today! http://signup.wispa.org/ -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- WISPA Wireless List: wireless@wispa.org Subscribe/Unsubscribe: http://lists.wispa.org/mailman/listinfo/wireless Archives: http://lists.wispa.org/pipermail/wireless/
