US President Joe Biden will sign an executive order Wednesday to protect American citizens’ personal information from countries deemed hostile.
The measure focuses on the trade of personal data collection and exchange between businesses and so-called data brokers. It is targeted at certain sensitive data, such as financial, biometric, geolocation, genetic, and other personally identifiable information – which the Biden Administration is concerned might be purchased by “countries of concern—which have a track record of collecting and misusing data on Americans”.
The measure mandates that the Department of Justice publish a number of regulations aimed at safeguarding private information. It also gives the DOJ and the Department of Homeland Security instructions “to set high security standards to prevent access by countries of concern to Americans’ data through other commercial means, such as data available via investment, vendor, and employment relationships”, the White House said in a release.
According to a White House fact sheet, hostile nations can utilize this information “to track Americans (including military service members), pry into their personal lives, and pass that data on to other data brokers and foreign intelligence services.”
Legislators and intelligence services have already voiced worries about national security issues stemming from the Chinese Communist Party’s accumulation of a large amount of American data. Last May, a bipartisan group of legislators requested details regarding the data collecting and distribution practices of over 20 firms, including Equifax and Oracle.
