United States. The National Security Memorandum (NSM) aims to secure and improve the resilience of America's critical infrastructure, replacing a decade-old presidential policy document.
Thus, the Biden Administration launches an effort to protect U.S. infrastructure against all threats and dangers, current and future.
"Thanks to the President's Investment in America Agenda, as well as the emergence of new technologies like Artificial Intelligence, America has a historic opportunity to build for the future. Good investments require taking steps to manage risk, and for our infrastructure that means building resilience to all hazards from the outset and by design," the White House said.
Through the President's America's Investment Agenda on America, the Biden-Harris Administration has announced $448 billion in Bipartisan Infrastructure Act funding and spurred some $825 billion in private sector investment in industries including clean energy, biomanufacturing, and clean energy manufacturing.
Under the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law alone, the President has delivered $50 billion for infrastructure resilience, including $8.7 billion from the Protect program to improve transportation infrastructure resiliency and $4.5 billion through FEMA to strengthen a variety of hazard infrastructure.
Through these $50 billion in resiliency funds, the Administration has launched more than 4,000 infrastructure projects across the country.
According to the government, the NSM will help ensure that U.S. critical infrastructure can provide the nation with a strong and innovative economy, protect American families, and improve their collective resilience to disasters before they occur, strengthening the nation for generations to come.
Scope
This NSM specifically empowers the Department of Homeland Security to lead the whole-of-government effort to protect U.S. critical infrastructure, with the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency acting as the National Security and Resiliency Coordinator.
It also coordinates the U.S. Intelligence Community, consistent with the goals outlined in the 2023 National Intelligence Strategy, to collect, produce, and share intelligence and information with federal departments and agencies, state and local partners, and the owners and operators of critical infrastructure.
It also reaffirms the designation of 16 critical infrastructure sectors and one federal department or agency as a Sector Risk Management Agency (SRMA) for each sector.
In addition, it elevates the importance of minimum security and resilience requirements within and between critical infrastructure sectors, in line with the National Cyber Strategy, which recognizes the limits of a voluntary approach to risk management in today's threat environment.
Context
The United States believes that its nation faces an era of strategic competition in which certain actors will continue to attack U.S. critical infrastructure and tolerate or enable malicious activities by non-state actors.
"In the event of a crisis or conflict, U.S. adversaries may seek to compromise our critical infrastructure to undermine the will of the American public and impede the functioning of the economy and the projection of U.S. military power abroad. Resilience, particularly for our most sensitive assets and systems, is the cornerstone of national defense and security," said spokespeople for the Federal Administration.
In addition, the growing impact of climate change, including changes in the frequency and intensity of natural hazards, as well as supply chain disruptions and the potential for instability, conflict, or mass displacement, put pressure on the infrastructure on which Americans depend.
