Two US senators introduced a bill which aims to assist cryptocurrency companies with reporting cybersecurity threats.
US senators Marsha Blackburn (R-TN) and Cynthia Lummis (R-WY) shared the legislation with reporters, known as the Cryptocurrency Cybersecurity Information Sharing Act. This bill would amend the Cybersecurity Information Sharing Act of 2015 to include cryptocurrency firms. The legislation was also endorsed by the Electronic Transactions Association.
“Some bad actors have used cryptocurrency as a way to hide their illegal practices and avoid accountability,” Blackburn said in a statement to reporters. “The Cryptocurrency Cybersecurity Information Sharing Act will update existing regulations to address this misuse directly. It will provide a voluntary mechanism for crypto companies to report bad actors and protect cryptocurrency from dangerous practices.”
This bill looks to minimize the losses from a number of cybersecurity incidents, including data breaches, ransomware attacks, business interruption and network damage, it stated.
According to a report by blockchain security company CertiK, there was a sharp increase in crypto-focused phishing attacks during the second quarter of 2022. In the first half of this year, however, over $2 billion was lost from hacks and exploits. This was a higher amount lost than the entirety of 2021 in half the time, the report added.
Lummis has generally been a very vocal supporter of the cryptocurrency industry and has sponsored and introduced a variety of new bills focused on the industry over the past few months.
In June of this year, Lummis introduced a bipartisan cryptocurrency bill with Senator Kirsten Gillibrand (D-NY). This legislation was proposed with the goal of installing guard rails around the digital asset sector. The 69-page bill covered a wide variety of crypto market subsectors, ranging from how to tax crypto transactions to guidelines for backing stablecoin.
The original bill, which was passed by the Senate in Oct. 2015, basically set up a structure for the U.S. government to coordinate cybersecurity reports from “private entities, non-federal government agencies, state, tribal, and local governments, the public, and entities under threats.” From here, the government would then recommend possible approaches for preventing and protecting against cyberattacks.