Sponsor
August Pfluger
Representative · R-TX
Representative · R-TX
Creates a temporary NTIA advisory board to advise on cybersecurity, BGP security, secure supply chains, and digital-economy policy.
Official title: To amend the National Telecommunications and Information Administration Organization Act to establish a Digital Economy and Cybersecurity Board of Advisors, and for other purposes.
Introduced February 21, 2025 by August Pfluger · Last progress February 21, 2025
The bill creates a temporary expert advisory board to improve routing and supply-chain security and accelerate best-practice adoption, trading stronger, coordinated technical guidance for risks of vendor bias, limited unpaid participation, concentrated executive control, and possible disruption when the board sunsets.
Internet users and businesses will benefit from expert recommendations to strengthen Internet routing (BGP), reducing outages and route hijacks.
Communications supply-chain stakeholders could get policy guidance to improve component security and resilience, lowering risk of service disruptions for utilities and state infrastructure.
The NTIA will receive coordinated, multi-stakeholder technical advice to inform federal policy, potentially speeding adoption of security best practices without creating new regulations.
Recommendations could effectively favor certain vendors or technologies, imposing implementation costs on network operators and shifting expenses to utilities and infrastructure operators.
The Assistant Secretary's broad appointment and removal authority concentrates control in the executive branch, risking politicization of technical advice and undermining perceived independence.
Uncompensated service may limit participation to those who can afford unpaid work, reducing diversity of perspectives and excluding less-resourced experts.
Based on analysis of 2 sections of legislative text.
Creates a time-limited advisory board inside the National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA) to advise the Assistant Secretary on cybersecurity and digital-economy policy. The Digital Economy and Cybersecurity Board of Advisors will be a 5–25 member expert panel (no registered lobbyists), chaired by an NTIA policy official, serve without pay, may form subcommittees, and will sunset four years after enactment.