On March 22, 2022, the Department of Defense (DoD) issued a final rule requiring contracting officers to consider supplier risk assessments in DoD’s Supplier Performance Risk System (SPRS) when evaluating offers. SPRS is a DoD enterprise system that collects contractor quality and delivery performance data from a variety of systems to develop three risk assessments:

On March 2, 2023, the Biden Administration released the 35-page National Cybersecurity Strategy (the “Strategy”) with a goal “to secure the full benefits of a safe and secure digital ecosystem for all Americans.”

Summary and Analysis

The Strategy highlights the government’s commitment to investing in cybersecurity research and new technologies to protect the nation’s security

Aiming to identify, enhance, and test supply chain vulnerabilities in the energy sector and cybersecurity response capabilities between public and private sectors, the U.S. Senate Committee on Energy & Natural Resources approved legislation that directs the Department of Energy (DoE) to create several new programs towards the development of “advanced cybersecurity applications and technologies” for the sector.[1]  The Energy Cybersecurity Act of 2019 (the Act) directs DoE to establish programs that identify supply chain vulnerabilities and expand Federal cooperation and coordination for responses to cyber threats.

If passed, the Act will require the DoE to:Continue Reading Energy Cybersecurity Act of 2019

In Ingham Regional Medical Center v. U.S. (Jan. 6, 2020), the Court of Federal Claims compelled production of certain government investigatory documents that the Court found were not privileged work product prepared “in anticipation of litigation.” The Medical Center sued to recover payments for outpatient healthcare services performed in connection with DoD’s TRICARE program

The National Institute of Standards and Technology (“NIST”) has extended the comment period on its recently released draft documents, NIST SP 800-171 Revision 2 and NIST SP 800-171B. The comment period for both NIST SP 800-171 Revision 2 and NIST SP 800-171B was initially open until July 19, 2019. It was recently extended to

Concluding its investigation into the internal accounting controls of nine public issuers who were recent cyber fraud victims, the Securities and Exchange Commission (“SEC”), Division of Enforcement explicitly reminded issuers to consider cyber-related threats in developing and deploying their Section 13(b)(2)(B) internal accounting controls.

The SEC emphasized the importance of tailoring internal accounting controls to cyber-related threats, noting that cyber frauds like those carried out in the nine cases it investigated have caused “over $5 billion in losses since 2013, with an additional $675 million in adjusted losses in 2017.”
Continue Reading SEC Encourages Internal Accounting Controls to Guard Against Cyber Fraud

Responding to the rise of interconnected technology, the National Institute for Standards and Technology (NIST) has recently issued an introductory document in a planned series of cybersecurity publications addressing Internet of Things (IoT) privacy risks.  Open for comment through October 24, 2018, the Draft NISTIR 8228, Considerations for Managing Internet of Things (IoT) Cybersecurity and

After over a decade, the first action has been filed that may test the bounds of the Support Anti-Terrorism by Fostering Effective Technologies Act (“SAFETY Act”) of 2002. MGM Resorts International recently filed suit related to the October 2017 Mandalay Bay country music concert shooting, asking a federal court to rule that it cannot be

Attorney General Jeff Sessions and EU Justice Commissioner Věra Jourová have met twice over the last two weeks, signaling momentum towards a new EU-U.S. solution for the sharing of electronic evidence. These meetings occurred in the wake of proposed regulations on the sharing of electronic evidence in the EU, and the passage of the Clarifying

The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (“FERC”) recently proposed that the North American Electric Reliability Corporation (“NERC”), which is responsible for promulgating and enforcing FERC-approved mandatory electric reliability standards, revise its Critical Infrastructure Protection (“CIP”) standards to require additional circumstances under which reporting of cybersecurity incidents is mandatory.   FERC’s goal is to enhance the awareness of