WASHINGTON, DC - Concerned with a growing threat of cybersecurity breaches, House Energy and Commerce Committee Chairman Fred Upton (R-MI) and Health Subcommittee Chairman Joseph Pitts (R-PA) today sent a letter to the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) about its ability to protect sensitive information. The committee is “examining the adequacy of FDA’s procedures to protect the trade secrets and confidential commercial information of regulated entities in the food industry."
Upton and Pitts write, “(T)he Food Safety and Modernization Act (FSMA) has recently expanded FDA’s access to sensitive proprietary information. Recent cybersecurity breaches at FDA and a criminal insider trading case involving an FDA official accessing information from drug review files in which he was not a part of the review team and did not have a need to know highlight the importance of FDA’s ability to safeguard information security. Since FDA now has access to and possession of the most highly sensitive and proprietary information such as recipes and formulas, the committee seeks specific information from FDA on actions and plans for protecting this kind of information."
Citing the FDA’s legal obligation under the Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act, as well as other civil and criminal laws, Upton and Pitts explain that the FDA must protect trade secrets and other confidential information, and request information about what measures FDA is taking to protect these types of information. In light of insider trading concerns, the leaders also requested information on procedures to ensure trade secrets only involve pertinent agency personnel.
* Letter to FDA on Security of Food Industry Trade Secrets and Confidential Information
