Page 11: of Marine News Magazine (April 2024)

10 12

Q&A

Increasingly, cyber security has been gaining focus as an area of concern across maritime supply chains, and recently the Coast Guard has been tasked with creating and enforcing maritime cyber standards. What do you hope to see from these standards as they are drafted and put to use?

Two key watchwords here are going to be risk-based and scalable. Everybody needs to have good cyber hygiene— any business, anybody who uses a computer, anybody who has electronically controlled and connected systems.

It’s really important for safety, for security, for the bottom line as everybody knows. Good cybersecurity practices, cyber-risk management practices absolutely should be part of a company’s safety management system. We’re doing a deeper dive into the Coast Guard’s proposed rule. What we hope to see and what we’ll really be advocating for is an approach that is risk-based, recognizes that not every com- pany’s or vessel’s risk pro? le is the same and that recognizes that company size and sophistication also varies. So, what does a cyber-risk management program look like if I’m op- erating two harbor tugs in Evansville, Ind., versus if I am operating six terminals at the port of New York and New

Jersey? We should both have good cyber, no question, but what that looks like is and should be a little bit different based on size, scale and risk.

prescribed timeframes. AWO has been actively involved in helping the

What we’re seeing now is it’s not only AWO, ves- industry address workforce issues, which con- sel owners and maritime labor who are saying this; it’s tinue to be a major challenge for many compa- the Coast Guard saying, “We’ve been telling you this, nies. Will you please discuss these efforts and

CARB. We continue to have concerns that you haven’t their impacts?

addressed.” And I think the increasing media coverage At AWO, our ? rst mission is to be an advocate for the that we’re seeing and the introduction of legislation in industry. We want to make sure that government agencies the California assembly is re? ective of the fact that there are not making a challenge worse by what they do or fail to are serious unresolved concerns. The fact that EPA has do. We work very hard with the Coast Guard to make sure had California’s request for a waiver to allow it to enforce that their National Maritime Center has ef? cient processes these regulations on its desk for quite a while and hasn’t for reviewing and approving merchant mariner credentials. approved it, I think, can be read as EPA has serious ques- We want to make sure that we don’t ever have mariners tions and concerns. who are frustrated and consider leaving the industry be-

I hope that Governor Newsom will take note of this and cause it’s just too hard to get and maintain the credentials will recognize that there is a path forward here, but it does that they need for their livelihood. We want to make sure require engaging with industry, engaging with the Coast we never have companies, vessel owners who say, “I have a

Guard and making some revisions so we have a rule that’s boat that needs to sail, and I have someone who can’t get going to be both effective and safe. their license renewed because the NMC is using late-20th www.marinelink.com MN 11|