President Obama to unveil initiatives to improve US cybersecurity

President Barack Obama is set to unveil a series of initiatives to bolster U.S. cybersecurity that he will detail in speeches this week. The U.S. president will lay out a series of legislative proposals and executive actions that will be in his State of the Union that will tackle identity theft and privacy issues, cybersecurity, and access to the Internet, reported the New York Times, quoting a White House official. The recent, high-profile hack into Sony’s corporate networks, which federal investigators have blamed on North Korea, may strengthen the president’s hand as he attempts to get a cybersecurity bill passed by a legislature that is controlled by his political opposition. In addition, the recent increase in severity of intrusions into major U.S. retailers such as Home Depot and Target, which has cost millions of dollars in fraudulent credit-card transactions, has made identity-theft an even more urgent issue.