Bill seeks to combat tech threats especially from China

A bipartisan bill that would help combat tech-specific threats to national security posed by foreign nations and would improve interagency coordination across the U.S. government recently was introduced in the U.S. Senate.

The legislation seeks to establish the Office of Critical Technologies and Security at the White House. The office would be responsible for interagency coordination and for developing a long-term, whole-of-government strategy to protect against state-sponsored technology theft and risks to critical supply chains.

The bill was introduced by Senate Select Committee on Intelligence members Sens. Marco Rubio (R-FL) and Mark R. Warner (D-VA).

“It is clear that China is determined to use every tool in its arsenal to surpass the United States technologically and dominate us economically,” Warner said. “We need a whole-of-government technology strategy to protect U.S. competitiveness in emerging and dual-use technologies and address the Chinese threat by combating technology transfer from the United States. We look forward to working with the Executive Branch and others to coordinate and respond to this threat.”

In September, the senators were among a bipartisan group that introduced legislation to force Chinese state-directed telecommunications firm ZTE to fully comply with probationary conditions that ended U.S. imposed sanctions.