Florida Senator Marco Rubio, the chairman of the U.S. Senate Small Business and Entrepreneurship Committee, advanced three bills relating to cyber security and disaster recovery.
The sunshine state Senator has made cyber security a priority, and he frequently criticizes Huawei technologies as posing a significant risk to the United States. He most recently took to twitter to share that “any nation short sighted enough to allow them to develop its domestic telecommunications infrastructure can be spied on by China at will.”
As expected the U.K. has found that #Huawei technologies pose a significant risk.
Any nation short sighted enough to allow them to develop its domestic telecommunications infrastructure can be spied on by #China at will. https://t.co/QZxLsy9Ps2 via @NYTimes
— Marco Rubio (@marcorubio) March 28, 2019
Without opposition, his committee advanced the “Small Business Cyber Training Act,” a bipartisan effort that “would create a training program for small business development centers to prepare counselors in cyber planning assistance.” In addition, the bill “would require small business development centers to have employees certified in cyber strategy counseling for small businesses.”
Another bill that was advanced is the “SBA Cyber Awareness Act,” another bipartisan effort that “would require the Small Business Administration to develop a cyber strategy, examine its IT system components’ country of origin, and report on breaches and threats to the Small Business Committees.”
Finally, the third bill that was advanced, with the help of Senator Rubio and Democratic 2020 Presidential candidate Senator Cory Booker was Republican Senator John Kenney’s “Rebuilding Small Businesses After Disaster Act,” which “would make permanent changes to collateral requirements for unsecured SBA disaster loans for physical damages.”
The Florida Senator provided additional information on the matter, explaining that “small businesses are most vulnerable when they are hit by unexpected incidents like cyberattacks and natural disasters.” Moreover, “with more than half of small businesses plagued by phishing attacks, Congress must act to help entrepreneurs better prepare against cybercrime.” With that being said, the Florida Senator concluded that said bills “address the urgent need for better cybersecurity for businesses and for our federal agencies.”
