14 DAY TRIAL // On Wednesday, President Joe Biden will meet with top executives from some of the country's largest technology and financial companies, as the White House seeks private sector backing for a unified cyber defense against emerging threats, according to MCU Times.
The gathering comes amid an increase in ransomware attacks on critical infrastructure, extorting multi-million dollar payments from large corporations, and other illicit cyber operations linked to foreign hackers by US authorities. According to a senior government official, the purpose of the conversation is to identify the root causes of hostile cyber activity as well as ways in which the private sector may contribute to enhancing cybersecurity.
The President Biden proposed an infrastructure bill would provide about $1 trillion in cybersecurity subsidies to state, local and tribal governments.In the meantime, the federal government has announced new cybersecurity guidelines for pipeline operators that would require them to report cyber intrusions to the Department's Cybersecurity Division Homeland Security's and Infrastructure Security Agency and fund future cybersecurity measures.
The gathering will be attended by the leaders of the most significant IT companies
The meeting will be held behind closed doors and feature Google's parent company Alphabet's CEO Sundar Pichai, Apple CEO Tim Cook, Amazon CEO Andy Jassy along with leaders from IBM, Microsoft, and ADP. The same source says that representatives from banking and financial services companies, as well as representatives from the education, insurance, and energy sectors, will also be attending.
The wide range of participants shows how cyber attacks have impacted virtually every corporate sector. For example, in May, hackers linked to the Russian cyber gang malware on a major U.S. oil pipeline, briefly halting operations. A few weeks later, another hacker group attacked the world's largest meat processor, JBS SA. Both corporations paid millions of dollars in ransom to reinstate their services.
The cybersecurity context is concerning, as President Biden declared that a massive cyberattack could trigger a "real shooting war.". Everyone hopes that such an event can be averted through more effective cooperation between the government and major companies on cyber security.