The Government Accountability Office has called on the Department of Veterans Affairs, NASA, Office of Personnel Management and the Nuclear Regulatory Commission to address weaknesses in their access controls for information systems that store sensitive data.

GAO said in a report released Tuesday the four federal agencies should also fully implement the components of their information security initiatives, such as security and remedial action plans as well as control assessments.

GAO made the recommendations after it found lapses in contingency planning, access controls and patch management operations across the four agencies.

The congressional audit agency also surveyed 24 federal agencies and found that 18 of them said they consider cyber attacks launched by foreign countries as the most serious threat to their data systems.

Out of 18 agencies, 11 reported 2,267 cyber incidents that compromised their information systems in fiscal year 2014, according to the report.

GAO also advised the Office of Management and Budget to complete the development of security plans and practices in order to help federal agencies protect their information infrastructure from cyber threats.

A coalition of trade groups and technology firms has called on congressional leaders to support a bipartisan bill in an effort to block the proposed changes to a rule that would authorize law enforcement officials to seek search warrants for remote “government hacking.”

The coalition asked Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Kentucky) and House Speaker Paul Ryan (R-Wisconsin) in a letter published Tuesday to back the Stopping Mass Hacking Act in order to provide Congress more time to consider the potential implications of the proposed amendments to Rule 41 of the Federal Rules of Criminal Procedure before such changes take effect on Dec. 1.

The changes to Rule 41 would allow federal agents to apply for search warrants that would authorize them to find criminals whose computers’ locations are hidden, Assistant Attorney General Leslie Caldwell wrote in a blog post published Monday.

The second proposed amendment to the rule would allow law enforcement authorities to apply for a consolidated search warrant that would permit them to investigate threat actors that breached computers that are located in at least five judicial districts, Caldwell added.

“This proposal is dangerously broad,” the coalition wrote in the letter that was also addressed to Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nevada) and House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-California).

“It fails to provide appropriate guidelines for safeguarding privacy and security, and it circumvents the legislative process that would provide Congress and the public the critically necessary opportunity to evaluate these issues.”