The House on Wednesday passed by voice vote a bipartisan bill aimed at improving data sharing within the Department of Homeland Security by boosting the department’s efforts to consolidate disparate databases systems across its various agencies.
The Department of Homeland Security Data Framework Act of 2018 (H.R. 2454) now goes to President Trump’s desk for this signature. The Senate passed the legislation last week.
The bill requires the development of “a data framework to integrate existing Department of Homeland Security datasets and systems, as appropriate, for access by authorized personnel in a manner consistent with relevant legal authorities and privacy, civil rights, and civil liberties policies and protections,” it says.
The relevant data that Congress wants shared more easily includes information on homeland security, terrorism, weapons of mass destruction, and national intelligence.
DHS has two years to complete the framework, which must include “mechanisms for identifying insider threats” and security risks.
The House previously passed the bill, which was introduced by Rep. Will Hurd (R-Texas), in 2017 but had to take it up again after it was amended in the Senate.
“We live in an increasingly connected world and must be able to get the right information to the right people at the right time in order to keep terrorists on the run and off our shores,” Hurd said in a statement Dec. 7, a day after the Senate passed the measure. “The DHS Data Framework Act does just that by allowing DHS to quickly and safely share sensitive information among law enforcement agencies without compromising our nation’s secrets.”