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Bill

S 39

Relates to providing electronic toll collection devises for milk dealers free of charge

2025 Regular Session Introduced by Mark Walczyk

Establishes the Massachusetts Cyber Incident Response Team to coordinate planning, response, and recovery from cyber threats affecting government and critical infrastructure.

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Bill Summary · S 39

Summary — Senate Bill No. 39 (Massachusetts) — “An Act protecting sensitive personal information from breaches and other cybersecurity incidents”

Note on source material: The packet provided contains conflicting metadata (a different short title about toll devices, federal sponsors, and multiple committee referrals). This summary is based on the legislative text included under “SENATE . . . No. 39” (filed 1/17/2025) presented by Senator Barry R. Finegold, which establishes a Massachusetts Cyber Incident Response Team and related cybersecurity provisions. Verify external references if you need to reconcile the other metadata entries.

Purpose / Intent

To strengthen the Commonwealth’s ability to prevent, respond to, mitigate and recover from significant cybersecurity incidents affecting governmental entities and critical infrastructure, and to protect sensitive personal information from breaches by creating a standing Massachusetts Cyber Incident Response Team and related planning, coordination and exercise requirements.

Key provisions

  • Emergency declaration: The act is declared an emergency law for immediate effect.
  • Definitions: Establishes terms such as “critical infrastructure,” “cybersecurity incident,” “cybersecurity threat,” “governmental entity,” and “response team.”
  • Creation of Massachusetts Cyber Incident Response Team (the “response team”):
    • Functions as a standing subcommittee of the referenced “office.”
    • Mission: enhance preparedness, response, mitigation and recovery from cybersecurity incidents.
  • Composition (membership examples listed in text):
    • Secretary of Technology Services and Security (or designee) — chair.
    • Representatives from: Commonwealth Security Operations Center, state police cyber crime unit, Commonwealth Fusion Center, Massachusetts National Guard (adjutant general), Massachusetts Emergency Management Agency, the comptroller, and others as assigned by the chair.
    • Chair must designate a liaison to federal agencies.
  • Duties and planning:
    • Review threat information, intrusion methods, vulnerabilities and best practices; coordinate with local, state, federal and industry partners.
    • Develop and maintain an updated Commonwealth cybersecurity incident response plan.
    • Annual submission of the plan to the Governor and the Joint Committee on Advanced Information Technology, the Internet and Cybersecurity by November 1 each year.
    • Plan contents (non-exhaustive): ongoing/anticipated incidents, risk analysis for critical infrastructure, resource deployment recommendations, best practices to minimize impacts, and guidance on communications with entities demanding ransom.
    • The plan is exempt from public record disclosure.
  • Exercises and testing:
    • Full-plan tabletop exercises at least twice per year.
    • Quarterly tabletop exercises with selected subsets of governmental entities.
  • Incident authority (partial text included):
    • In events causing material impairment of governmental infrastructure/services, the Secretary of Technology Services and Security (with Governor’s approval) shall serve as director of the response team; further incident authorities and operational measures are described in the bill (text truncated in source).

Who is affected

  • State and local governmental entities (required participants and beneficiaries of the plan and exercises).
  • Operators of critical infrastructure in the Commonwealth (subject to risk analysis and recommendations).
  • Residents and individuals whose sensitive personal information is maintained by governmental entities.
  • State agencies and emergency response organizations (tasked with coordination and participation).

Procedural / timeline notes

  • Filed in the Senate docket 1/17/2025; presented by Sen. Barry R. Finegold.
  • The bill designates annual and recurring deadlines for plan submission (Nov 1) and recurring exercise schedules (biannual full exercises; quarterly subset exercises).
  • The bill includes an emergency clause for immediate effect upon enactment.
  • Source material in the packet shows other, conflicting legislative actions and sponsor lists — confirm the correct bill number and chamber if you need to track current status or locate committee hearings and votes.

If you want, I can produce a one‑page comparison showing how this bill differs from prior related measures (e.g., S.2539 of 2023–24) or extract and summarize the truncated sections if you provide the remainder of the text.

Compiled from official sources — confirm details with the bill’s official record.

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