Government Officials to Host Meeting on WWS Cybersecurity

The heads of the Environmental Protection Agency and the federal government wrote to all U.S. governors on Tuesday about the need to discuss cybersecurity and critical infrastructure matters facing the water and wastewater system sector.

EPA Administrator Michael Regan and National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan said they will host a virtual meeting on March 21 to discuss how cyberthreats can impact environmental, health and homeland security matters. Among the topics to be discussed are vulnerabilities facing the WWS sector, ways to strengthen WWS cybersecurity, interagency anti-cyberthreat efforts and other developments in the sector.

The planned Water Sector Cybersecurity Task Force will also be discussed during the meeting. The task force is designed to use existing cybersecurity products to improve WWS cybersecurity and create cyber-related recommendations in partnership with relevant agencies, the EPA said Tuesday.

The meeting builds on the U.S. government’s efforts to improve WWS cybersecurity.

in January, the EPA, the FBI and the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency released guidance helping WWS owners and operators fend off cyberthreats. The guidance highlights key steps in preparing, detecting, analyzing, containing, eliminating and recovering from cyber intrusions.

In June 2023, the National Institute of Standards and Technology sought information from technology vendors about their products and expertise that could support a WWS cybersecurity project aimed at creating guidance for cyber-secure operations.