Sen Leahy Denounces Alarmists Over Latest Massive Cyberattack

News of yet another massive hack has been met with yet another urgent push from lawmakers and the Obama Administration to pass legislation that would increase the sharing of digital data between the private sector and the government. But privacy-minded lawmakers appear unswayed by the cyber intrusion announced by the Office of Personnel Management on June 4 that exposed the personally identifiable information of 4 million current and former federal employees during a breach detected in April.

Senate Judiciary Committee Ranking Member Patrick Leahy (D-VT) urged caution as Congress considers how best to respond to the hack and bolster its cyberdefenses. "I want to look more at what happened at OPM, but I worry that it's always, 'Pass this law immediately, because otherwise we're' -- fill in the blank," Ranking Member Leahy said. "You'd almost think ISIS was marching up Pennsylvania Avenue during this last debate, if we didn't pass it immediately," Ranking Member Leahy added, referencing some of the rhetoric surrounding this week's passage of the USA Freedom Act, a surveillance-reform bill that restored provisions of the Patriot Act that temporarily lapsed on June 1.