White House looks to curb foreign powers’ ability to buy Americans’ sensitive personal data with executive order

CNN —

President Joe Biden will issue an executive order on Wednesday aimed at curbing foreign governments’ ability to buy Americans’ sensitive personal information such as heath and geolocation data, according to senior US officials.

The move marks a rare policy effort to address a longstanding US national security concern: the ease with which anyone, including a foreign intelligence services, can legally buy Americans’ data and then use the information for espionage, hacking and blackmail. The issue, a senior Justice Department official told reporters this week, is a “growing threat to our national security.”

The executive order will give the Justice Department the authority to regulate commercial transactions that “pose an unacceptable risk” to national security by, for example, giving a foreign power large-scale access to Americans’ personal data, the Justice Department official said. The department will also issue regulations that require better protection of sensitive government information, including geolocation data on US military members, according to US officials.

A lot of the online trade in personal information runs through so-called data brokers, which buy information on people’s Social Security numbers, names, addresses, income, employment history and criminal background, as well as other items.

“Countries of concern, such as China and Russia, are buying Americans’ sensitive personal data from data brokers,” a separate senior administration official told reporters.

In addition to health and location data, the executive order is expected to cover other sensitive information like genomic and financial data. Administration officials told reporters the new executive order would be applied narrowly so