- FCC repeals cybersecurity regulations for telecommunications companies
- These protections were introduced after the network intrusion by the Chinese actor Salt Typhoon.
- The Trump administration is rolling back regulations across the industry
The Republican-led Federal Communications Commission (FCC) voted to roll back measures implemented following the Typhoon Salt attack.
The mandatory protections required telecommunications companies to adopt basic security controls and network protections – and encouraged collaboration among large network providers to protect consumers and national security.
The Salt Typhoone attacks saw malicious actors hiding in US telecommunications networks for more than a year, exfiltrating data in one of the largest cyberespionage campaigns on record.
“Neither legal nor effective”
The FCC voted to repeal the ruling, saying it was “ineffective because it did not address the nature of the relevant cybersecurity threats nor was it consistent with the agile, collaborative approach to cybersecurity that has proven effective,” Commission documents note.
FCC members say telecommunications companies are voluntarily beefing up their cybersecurity and hardening their networks against intrusions, so the regulations place a heavy legal burden on companies already doing the work.
Secretary Marlene Dortch said the shielding order “applies the same rigid and broad cybersecurity requirements to all telecommunications operators, without regard to their risk, size or organizational posture.”
“This vague and amorphous standard risks imposing costly new burdens on many vendors that are either irrelevant to the potential threats they face or are redundant because these vendors may already employ sufficient cybersecurity practices to reasonably reduce the risk of successful exploits by the most sophisticated threat actors,” she wrote.
The move follows a predictable trend in a Trump administration that has repeatedly illustrated its deprioritization of online protection, having already decimated public cybersecurity services through layoffs and reassignments within CISA.
The administration has also demonstrated its goals for deregulation, particularly in the technology sector – even going so far as to roll back state laws aimed at dismantling existing protections for AI consumers in order to give more freedoms to AI companies.
Via The file
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