Lawmakers to amend cybersecurity bill behind closed doors

[InfoSec News <alerts () infosecnews org>]

http://thehill.com/blogs/hillicon-valley/technology/291743-house-intel-panel-plans-closed-door-mark-up-of-cybersecurity-bill

By Brendan Sasso
Hillicon Valley
04/03/13

Members of the media and the public will not be able to watch the House 
Intelligence Committee's markup next week of a controversial cybersecurity 
bill, the Cyber Intelligence Sharing and Protection Act (CISPA).

Lawmakers will be allowed to discuss what happened in the meeting afterward, 
and the committee plans to release information about what amendments were 
offered and how lawmakers voted. But the public will not be allowed in the 
room, and the meeting will not be streamed online.

Susan Phalen, a spokeswoman for the committee, explained that the Intelligence 
Committee often restricts access to hearings and that it is possible that 
lawmakers will need to discuss classified information.

"Sometimes they'll need to bounce into classified information and go closed for 
a period of time to talk," she said. "In order to keep the flow of the mark-up 
continuing forward, you can't stop in the middle of an open hearing, move 
everyone to another location for a portion of it, and then move back."

She noted that the committee used the same procedure when it marked up CISPA 
last year.

[...]


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