Hacker, Journalist Among CISA Directors’ 23 New Cybersecurity Advisors

Following the establishment of the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) advisory committee in June 2021, the agency director, Jen Easterly, appointed members that span industry, academia, and government to battle evolving cyber threats. This committee was authorized as part of the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) of 2021. The act allows for 35 total members of the committee and, thus far, 23 members have been named. The act requires representation from the defense, education, financial services, health care, manufacturing, media, entertainment, chemical, retail, transportation, energy, information technology, and communication sectors.
There is a large emphasis by Easterly on working to appoint others, including members of the hacker community to serve on the committee. She believes hackers are of utmost importance to leverage to try to prevent attacks such as SolarWinds that had major impacts on a variety of industries. These critical vulnerabilities must be discovered quickly and remediated quickly to prevent far reaching damages of future malicious attacks on critical infrastructure.
The group that Easterly has put together will meet at least twice a year and look to identify ways to enhance the pool of talent in the cyber industry, reduce critical risks, and better coordinate cooperation and collaboration between the public and private sector.
More information can be found at: https://www.nextgov.com/cybersecurity/2021/12/hacker-journalist-among-cisa-directors-23-new-cybersecurity-advisors/187192/