To prevent cyberattacks, the White House is considering an executive order restricting the operations of American cloud providers like Amazon overseas in countries such as China, while also introducing new reporting requirements. Senior officials met to discuss the order late last week and aim to have President Trump sign it by the end of this year.
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- Under the already drafted executive order, the U.S. Department of Commerce would be able to ban American cloud companies from partnering with foreign providers that offer hackers safe haven.
- The order would also make it possible for the department to ban such companies from operating in the U.S., and mandate stateside cloud companies keep a log of foreign customer's identities.
- With the order, the government hopes to prevent malicious actors from using cloud service providers to quickly conduct cyberattacks while remaining anonymous.
- One anonymous official adds the government is not just introducing the order because of China alone, although admitted they are concerned in particular about Chinese hackers and cloud providers. “Getting China to take seriously and follow up, investigate, and prosecute their own cybercrime in their own borders is a continuously challenging issue,” the official explained.