Author: Paul Diamond, Public Policy Director

Cybersecurity continues to be a top concern for our nation’s policy leaders and for C-suite executives in the private sector as well. This security focus is amplified in certain industries that are widely recognized as performing functions that are critical to our national security.

Strong partnerships and collaboration among critical infrastructure providers and the public sector are vital to our nation’s ability to combat and counteract cyber threats.

As a designated critical infrastructure provider, CenturyLink plays a prominent role within the communications industry and with a wide range of public and private sector organizations to help keep us secure.

For example, we were recently selected to provide secure cloud connectivity to the U.S. Census Bureau to help them digitize the 2020 Census by moving it to an online platform, thus supporting the agency’s IT modernization efforts.

As a leading provider of Managed Trusted Internet Protocol Service (MTIPS), CenturyLink offers the Census Bureau and other government agencies a highly secure, reliable and scalable MTIPS infrastructure that is capable of detecting and defending against aggressive network attacks while meeting the federal government’s strict security standards and requirements.

And, by supplying cybersecurity, cloud, managed hosting and IT services over our carrier-class network, CenturyLink provides government agencies with the security and reliability they need to carry out their important missions.

CenturyLink’s credibility comes from our work as a critical infrastructure provider and leader in establishing sound cybersecurity policies and governance for the communications sector. We are a trusted partner for collaborative public-private relationships, including our recent cybersecurity work with the U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS) and ongoing support for the technical working groups of the FCC’s Communications Security, Reliability, and Interoperability Council (CSRIC).

CenturyLink also provided crucial input and leadership to the recent DHS Information and Communications Technology (ICT) criticality assessment that will support the development of additional strategies to protect our nation’s critical communications infrastructure.

In addition, CenturyLink has been providing considerable policy, security and legal expertise to the DHS ICT Supply Chain Risk Management Task Force working groups. We are providing leadership and support for four workstreams on current supply chain risks, including information exchange; threat-based evaluation of ICT supplies, products, and services; development of qualified bidder and manufacturer lists; and purchase of ICT from original manufacturers or authorized resellers. This public-private effort includes 20 federal agencies as well as 40 of the largest companies in the ICT sector.

We were also recently selected to help support a Government Accountability Office (GAO) report to Congress on the use and impacts of the U.S. Department of Commerce’s National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) Cybersecurity Framework. Through our written response and comprehensive discussions with policymakers, we conveyed that NIST’s Cybersecurity Framework has been a valuable tool for ensuring that security is integrated throughout an entire organization. 

Finally, as technology evolves, cybersecurity threats continue to evolve as well and are a highly complex, diverse and dynamic challenge we must all face head-on. That is why at CenturyLink, we believe that cross-organizational collaboration is truly necessary to combat the everchanging and fluid cyber threat landscape. We will continue to lend our expertise, insight and tools while collaborating with our public and private sector partners because in the end, we are all in this cyber fight together.

To learn more about CenturyLink Public Policy, please visit us at:

Public Policy Homepage: https://www.centurylink.com/aboutus/company-information/public-policy.html 

Twitter: https://twitter.com/CenturyLinkPol