The Trump administration’s recent cuts to the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) sparked concern among cybersecurity professionals, particularly regarding election security. While the cuts represent a small percentage of CISA’s overall workforce, the decision to place election security personnel on administrative leave has raised widespread concerns within cybersecurity circles that the layoffs could ultimately hurt the nation’s readiness to fend off future cyberattacks.
Denise Anderson, president of Health ISAC, which facilitates cyber threat intelligence sharing in the healthcare sector, acknowledged the seriousness of the changes but tempered alarmist rhetoric.
“The sky isn’t falling, yet,” Anderson said. “But we need to remain vigilant, and industry must step up to fill any gaps left behind by CISA.”
“We still have the relationships in place. We’re continuing as business as usual,” Anderson told SC Media. “But the Election Infrastructure ISAC has lost its funding, and that does raise concerns.”
Anderson also emphasized that ISACs, in general, have a long history of operating independently from the federal government and pre-date CISA, which was created in 2018.
“Let me clarify — ISACs in general have been around before DHS (2002),” Anderson explained. “The Financial Services ISAC started in 1999, and the National Council of ISACs came into being in 2003, before DHS ever existed. ISACs are communities of trust built on private-sector collaboration, and that model has worked for over 25 years.”
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This article includes the following:
- Why this matters to CISOs and the private sector
- CISA’s workforce reductions: Understanding the scale
- The impact on cybersecurity resilience
- CISA’s leadership vacuum creates uncertainty
- Can ISACs fill in CISA gaps?
- A silver lining? Former CISA employees are already organizing
