President Joe Biden recently unveiled an unprecedented Executive Order to protect Americans' sensitive personal data from exploitation by foreign adversaries. This marks the most sweeping action taken by a president to secure Americans' data.
The order enables the U.S. Department of Justice to halt large-scale transfers of sensitive information, such as genomic, biometric, location, health, and financial data.
Regulations can be put in place to bar U.S. companies from selling data to high-risk nations, including China, Russia, Iran, and North Korea. The aim is to close loopholes allowing authoritarian regimes access to data that could enable surveillance, blackmail, and other civil rights violations targeting Americans.
As the White House fact sheet outlined, "Companies are collecting more of Americans' data than ever before, and it is often legally sold and resold through data brokers. Commercial data brokers and other companies can sell this data to countries of concern." This data frequently lands in the hands of foreign militaries and intelligence services.
Cybersecurity expert Claude Mandy, Chief Evangelist at Symmetry Systems, hailed the move but cautioned it does not alleviate the urgent need for comprehensive federal privacy laws.
"This pivotal action targets the safeguarding of our most private data from countries of concern, and the team at Symmetry Systems applauds this action to force organizations to better safeguard the data within their control," Mandy said. "This action represents a significant stride towards clear federal regulation on the security of the data of Americans, but stops short of requiring a federal privacy law, only encouraging the need for bipartisan privacy legislation."
While questions remain around enforcement and the broader gaps in America's data privacy regime, President Biden's directive marks an important milestone in securing citizens' personal information. It sends a resounding message: the exploitation of people's most sensitive data will not be tolerated. Yet lasting change will ultimately require legislators to step up and enact comprehensive privacy reforms into law.
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