What Trump’s 2020 budget has to say about cyber
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The administration's cyber priorities include increasing the qualified pool of cyber workers in government and boosting funds for cyber risk assessments, investigations and law enforcement.
The White House's 2020 budget proposal offers insight into the administration's cybersecurity policy priorities, which include increasing the qualified pool of cyber workers in government and boosting funds for cyber risk assessments, investigations and law enforcement.
The budget adds funding for the Department of Homeland Security's Cyber Talent Management System that aims to hire 150 new cybersecurity employees by 2020 and resources to increase the number of DHS-led network risk assessments from 473 to 684 and incorporate state and local election systems. It also includes more than $1 billion for cybersecurity efforts at the Department of Homeland Security, including governmentwide cybersecurity programs like Einstein and Continuous Diagnostics and Mitigation.
However, the total amount dedicated for cybersecurity at DHS is similar to the $1 billion the administration proposed last year and woefully low for what is supposed to be the federal government's premier civilian cyber department, a staffer on the House Homeland Security Committee said, especially when compared to the $9.6 billion the plan envisions for cybersecurity operations at the Department of Defense.
The proposed cyber budget for the Pentagon includes funds to safeguarding DOD networks, information and systems and provides resources for its cyber workforce and military cyber forces.
The FBI is adding $70 million to its cybersecurity budget request to "support the development of advanced technical capabilities and the implementation of a comprehensive, multi-pronged strategy to target malicious cyber actors that threaten global U.S. interests," per its budget factsheet. The National Security Division at the Justice Department is seeking an 8.5 percent increase over enacted 2019 funding levels, which covers efforts to combat cybercrime and reviews of foreign investments in the U.S. and export control.
The Committee on Foreign Investments in the United States, chaired by the Secretary of the Treasury, has become an increasingly important tool in the federal government's arsenal for combatting national security threats to the supply chain. The budget sets aside $35 million for the Department of Treasury "to ensure swift, robust and effective implementation" of the Foreign Investment Risk Review Modernization Act, which was passed in 2018 and focuses on investment risks for critical U.S. technology and infrastructure.
It also calls for $167 million for Treasury's Office of Terrorism and Financial Intelligence that "would expand [the Financial Crimes Enforcement Network's] special measures enforcement activities and enhance its efforts to combat cybercrime and cryptocurrency threats." The budget also sets aside $18 million to protect Treasury's IT systems and $13 million "to enhance the Department's capacity to identify and remediate new vulnerabilities before they can be exploited."
The Department of Energy's recently established Office of Cybersecurity, Energy Security, and Emergency Response is slotted for over $156 million to support early-stage research into protecting critical infrastructure.
This article was first posted to FCW, a sibling site to GCN.