Week ahead: Cyber firms face Brexit questions

The United Kingdom’s shocking vote to leave the European Union has upended financial markets and could shake up the country’s cybersecurity industry as well.

Britain’s cybersecurity scene has been booming, but now those companies face new questions.

Topping the list is a potential crunch with staffing, experts say.

{mosads}Like the United States, British firms have relied on a flow of foreign labor to fill the country’s surplus of cyber jobs. Those jobs have been easier to fill with Britain part of the EU, but companies are expressing worries that could be disrupted after Thursday’s vote.

British cyber firms are also worried about potential barriers to trading in the future with the EU, including new red tape that could raise their costs.

Britain’s exit from the European Union could throw many international agreements into disarray. Free trade deals in particular, as well as rules governing data security, data retention and law enforcement cooperation. Some rules that gave British businesses’ preferential treatment could evaporate.

Those were some of the reasons why the U.K.’s tech industry as a whole expressed strong opposition to Brexit. In a poll taken in March, 87 percent of tech sector workers polled were opposed to leaving the EU with only 3 percent in favor.

And cyber experts also expressed concerns that Brexit could hurt national security by costing talent and weakening cross-border cooperation.

A third of cyber researchers in a recent poll said exiting the union would make the U.K. open to more cyber attacks.

Those Brexit questions could take some time to answer, but one item on the EU’s short-term agenda is the fate of a transatlantic data deal.

The EU and United States agreed to revisions on a key transatlantic data pact. The changes put new limits on U.S. surveillance and on how long firms can retain customers’ personal data.

The new version of the Privacy Shield was sent to the 28 EU member states for review. The EU could vote on the agreement as early as July.

The new talks over a Privacy Shield came after the long-standing arrangement used by companies for moving data across the Atlantic was struck down by a EU court in October over concerns about U.S. surveillance practices.

Back on Capitol Hill in the coming week, the House will be out but senators have a number of cyber items on their docket.

The Senate Armed Services will meet for a closed hearing on cybersecurity and encryption issues on Thursday at 9:30 a.m.

Encryption continues to be a thorny issue in Congress. The hearing comes on the heels of a report from a joint encryption working group of House Judiciary and Energy and Commerce members. The group’s report foresaw “a range of obstacles to broad legislative mandates to require special access to law enforcement.”

There will also be a Senate Commerce hearing on the Internet of Things and new transportation technologies on Tuesday at 10 a.m.

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