Cybersecurity, Consumer Snitching and an Insurance Downgrade
A new bill to would give the White House “cybersecurity emergency” powers.
Consumer Reports magazine turns a high-performing showerhead over to the EPA for exceeding the federal water-flow limit.
Insurance rating agency A.M. Best downgrades Tower Hill Insurance after their purchase of private reinsurance to replace government-run coverage.
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1. TECHNOLOGY
A new bill to would give the White House “cybersecurity emergency” powers.
CEI Expert Available to Comment: Vice President for Policy Wayne Crews on why centralizing risk management will make us less, not more secure:
“From American telecommunications to the power grid, virtually anything networked to some other computer is potentially fair game to Obama to exercise ‘emergency powers. Policy makers should be suspicious of proposals to collectivize and centralize cybersecurity risk management, especially in frontier industries like information technology. When government asserts authority over security technologies, it hinders the evolution of more robust information security practices and creates barriers to non-political solutions—both mundane and catastrophic. The result is that we become less secure, not more secure.”
2. CONSUMER
Consumer Reports magazine turns a high-performing showerhead over to the EPA for exceeding the federal water-flow limit.
CEI Expert Available to Comment: General Counsel Sam Kazman on the freedom to shower without government limits:
“Consumer Reports has it backwards. Its duty is to consumers, not bureaucrats. It should not be acting as a nosy bathroom cop, trying to toss good products in the slammer just because they violate some intrusive federal regulation. More basically, people ought to be able to use whatever shower fixtures they want, just like they can decide how long a shower to take. This is a really victimless crime.”
3. BUSINESS
Insurance rating agency A.M. Best downgrades Tower Hill Insurance after their purchase of private reinsurance to replace government-run coverage.
CEI Expert Available to Comment: Florida Insurance Project Director Christian Cámara on the state’s perverse incentives for insurance companies:
“Tower Hill’s purchase of private reinsurance in addition to state-mandated CAT Fund coverage protects its policyholders and ensures payment of claims in the aftermath of a hurricane. Unfortunately, Florida’s existing regulatory system discourages companies from doing this, as they have to jump through onerous bureaucratic hoops to charge what they need to in order to invest in this additional level of coverage.”
Listen to LibertyWeek, the CEI podcast, here.