[Congressional Bills 118th Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
[H.R. 4755 Introduced in House (IH)]
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118th CONGRESS
1st Session
H. R. 4755
To support research on privacy enhancing technologies and promote
responsible data use, and for other purposes.
_______________________________________________________________________
IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
July 19, 2023
Ms. Stevens (for herself and Mr. Kean of New Jersey) introduced the
following bill; which was referred to the Committee on Science, Space,
and Technology
_______________________________________________________________________
A BILL
To support research on privacy enhancing technologies and promote
responsible data use, and for other purposes.
Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the
United States of America in Congress assembled,
SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE.
This Act may be cited as the ``Privacy Enhancing Technology
Research Act''.
SEC. 2. PRIVACY ENHANCING TECHNOLOGY.
(a) National Science Foundation Support of Research on Privacy
Enhancing Technology.--The Director of the National Science Foundation,
in consultation with the heads of other relevant Federal agencies (as
determined by the Director), shall support merit-reviewed and
competitively awarded research on privacy enhancing technologies, which
may include the following:
(1) Fundamental research on technologies for de-
identification, pseudonymization, anonymization, or obfuscation
to mitigate individuals' privacy risks in data sets while
maintaining fairness, accuracy, and efficiency.
(2) Fundamental research on algorithms and other similar
mathematical tools used to protect individual privacy when
collecting, storing, sharing, analyzing, or aggregating data.
(3) Fundamental research on technologies that promote data
minimization in data collection, sharing, and analytics that
takes into account the trade-offs between the data minimization
goals and the informational goals of data collection.
(4) Research awards on privacy enhancing technologies
coordinated with other relevant Federal agencies and programs.
(5) Supporting education and workforce training research
and development activities, including re-training and
upskilling of the existing workforce, to increase the number of
privacy enhancing technology researchers and practitioners.
(6) Multidisciplinary socio-technical research that fosters
broader understanding of privacy preferences, requirements, and
human behavior to inform the design and adoption of effective
privacy solutions.
(7) Development of freely available privacy enhancing
technology software libraries, platforms, and applications.
(8) Fundamental research on techniques that may undermine
the protections provided by privacy enhancing technologies, the
limitations of such protections, and the trade-offs between
privacy and utility required for the deployment of such
technologies.
(b) Integration Into the Computer and Network Security Program.--
Subparagraph (D) of section 4(a)(1) of the Cyber Security Research and
Development Act (15 U.S.C. 7403(a)(1)(D)) is amended by inserting ``,
including privacy enhancing technologies'' before the semicolon.
(c) Coordination With the National Institute of Standards and
Technology and Other Stakeholders.--
(1) In general.--The Director of the Office of Science and
Technology Policy, acting through the Networking and
Information Technology Research and Development Program, shall
coordinate with the Director of the National Science
Foundation, the Director of the National Institute of Standards
and Technology, the Federal Trade Commission, and the heads of
other Federal agencies, as appropriate, to accelerate the
development, deployment, and adoption of privacy enhancing
technologies.
(2) Outreach.--The Director of the National Institute of
Standards and Technology shall conduct outreach to--
(A) receive input from private, public, and
academic stakeholders on the development of privacy
enhancing technologies; and
(B) facilitate and support ongoing public and
private sector engagement to inform the development and
dissemination of voluntary, consensus-based technical
standards, guidelines, methodologies, procedures, and
processes to cost-effectively increase the integration
of privacy enhancing technologies in data collection,
sharing, and analytics performed by the public and
private sectors.
(d) Report on Privacy Enhancing Technology Research.--Not later
than three years after the date of the enactment of this Act, the
Director of the Office of Science and Technology Policy, acting through
the Networking and Information Technology Research and Development
Program, shall, in coordination with the Director of the National
Science Foundation, the Director of the National Institute of Standards
and Technology, and the heads of other Federal agencies, as
appropriate, submit to the Committee on Commerce, Science, and
Transportation of the Senate, the Subcommittee on Commerce, Justice,
Science, and Related Agencies of the Committee on Appropriations of the
Senate, the Committee on Science, Space, and Technology of the House of
Representatives, and the Subcommittee on Commerce, Justice, Science,
and Related Agencies of the Committee on Appropriations of the House of
Representatives, a report containing information relating to the
following:
(1) The progress of research on privacy enhancing
technologies.
(2) The progress of the development of voluntary resources
described under subsection (c)(2)(B).
(3) Any policy recommendations that could facilitate and
improve communication and coordination between the private
sector and relevant Federal agencies for the implementation and
adoption of privacy enhancing technologies.
(e) Protecting Personal Identifying Information.--Any personal
identifying information collected or stored through the activities
authorized under this section shall be done in accordance with part 690
of title 45, Code of Federal Regulations (relating to the protection of
human subjects), or any successor regulation.
(f) Definition.--In this section, the term ``privacy enhancing
technology''--
(1) means any software or hardware solution, technical
process, or other technological means of mitigating
individuals' privacy risks arising from data processing by
enhancing predictability, manageability, disassociability, and
confidentiality; and
(2) may include--
(A) cryptographic techniques for facilitating
computation or analysis on data while mitigating
privacy risks;
(B) techniques for--
(i) publicly sharing data without enabling
inferences to be made about specific
individuals;
(ii) giving individuals' control over the
dissemination, sharing, and use of their data;
and
(iii) generating synthetic data; and
(C) any other technology or approach that reduces
the risk of re-identification, including when combined
with other information.
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