Private Sector Wants More Cyber Data, Gigi Sohn Push, Instagram Report Shows Abusive Messages

April 7, 2022 — On Wednesday, Robert Knake, who is in charge of budget and policy at the White House’s Office of the National Cyber Director, told a House Homeland Security subcommittee that the private sector is pushing the government for more cyber threat data.

“​​What we’ve heard from every private sector company we talked to is to make sure that we can provide the one thing that private companies can’t do on their own, which is intelligence,” Knake told the subcommittee.

The increase in a want for information comes after the federal government has repeatedly warned private sector companies to be wary of cyber attacks and ransomwares from Russia, as concern for Russia’s potential hacking of US companies has intensified by the Russian invasion of Ukraine and the U.S.’s response to implement severe sanctions on the country of Russia.

On March 15, President Joe Biden signed into law a law legislation that would require companies in the critical infrastructure space to notify the government of cyber attacks within 72 hours.

Trade associations push for Gigi Sohn

On Wednesday, several trade associations came out with a letter directed to Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-NY, and Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-KY, urging them to quickly confirm Gigi Sohn as the fifth commissioner of the Federal Communications Commission.

“While we may have disagreements with Sohn on specific issues, we firmly believe she is highly qualified for the position,” the letter states. “Sohn has extensive experience in technology and telecommunications policy and a long record of seeking bipartisan solutions. Moreover, she is widely respected as a passionate defender of free speech, a pragmatic thinker, a supporter of substantive and open debate, and a strong advocate to expand access to affordable broadband and critical technologies, values we believe are highly desirable for an FCC Commissioner.”

The letter came from seven different trade associations “representing the innovation economy,” including the Consumer Technology Association, Chamber of Progress, CompTIA, the Computer and Communications Industry Association, the Internet Infrastructure Coalition, INCOMPAS, and NTCA. The majority of these organizations have publicly endorsed Gigi Sohn as the newest FCC Commissioner in the past.

The letter is the first time that this specific group has come together to support Sohn.

New Instagram report shows failure in regard to abusive DMs

A new report released Wednesday shows that one in 15 Instagram direct messages out of a total of 8,717 direct messages that were sent to three different influential women leaders failed to comply with the photo-sharing app’s abuse and harassment regulations.

The report was conducted by the Center for Countering Digital Hate, a not-for-profit NGO that aims to address and dismantle online hate and abuse. The study found that 89.5 percent of accounts that sent abusive DMs to five well-known women remained active despite reporting the abuse on the platform.

“Instagram has chosen to side with abusers by negligently creating a culture in which abusers expect no consequences—denying women dignity and their ability to use digital spaces without harassment. There is an epidemic of misogynist abuse taking place in women’s DMs. Meta and Instagram must put the rights of women before profit,” Imran Ahmed, CEO of CCDH, said in a press release.

The findings come at a time when Meta, Instagram’s parent company, experiences scrutiny over its platforms’ effect on modern society.