Sens. Angus King, I-Maine, and Jim Risch, R-Idaho, have reintroduced a bill to secure the energy grid via government-industry engineering efforts. The Securing Energy Infrastructure Act would establish government-industry partnerships eliminating software vulnerabilities that create openings for cyber attacks, King’s office said Thursday.
The reintroduction intends to address the bill’s failure to pass the House before the 115th Congress’ end, despite the legislation unanimously passing the Senate in December. The legislation would create a two-year pilot program to study concealed security threats, and direct the secretary of energy to report results to Congress.
The bill would also task a group to assess National Laboratories’ proposed technologies, and form a national cyber strategy protecting the energy grid from potential attacks.
“Our bipartisan bill has broad support, as evidenced by its passage in the Senate last December, and I hope the new Congress will take swift action on it so we can proactively protect our country’s critical infrastructure from cyberattacks,” said King.
