44 U.S.C. § 3541
Section 3541 · Purposes
Amended 1 time on record
Applied in 4 court decisions — leading case Cobell v. Kempthorne (2006)
Most recently applied in U.S. Office of Pers. Mgmt. Data Sec. Breach Litig. v. Office of Pers. Mgmt. (June 2019)
How often courts cite this section
Court decisions citing this, by year.Markers show enactment, consequential amendments, and circuit splits over this section — watch for a citation surge after a change or a disagreement. The dip in the last several years is a data-coverage gap, not a real trend — our corpus holds fewer opinions from the most recent years, so recent citations are undercounted.
The purposes of this subchapter are to—
(1) provide a comprehensive framework for ensuring the effectiveness of information security controls over information resources that support Federal operations and assets;
(2) recognize the highly networked nature of the current Federal computing environment and provide effective governmentwide management and oversight of the related information security risks, including coordination of information security efforts throughout the civilian, national security, and law enforcement communities;
(3) provide for development and maintenance of minimum controls required to protect Federal information and information systems;
(4) provide a mechanism for improved oversight of Federal agency information security programs;
(5) acknowledge that commercially developed information security products offer advanced, dynamic, robust, and effective information security solutions, reflecting market solutions for the protection of critical information infrastructures important to the national defense and economic security of the nation that are designed, built, and operated by the private sector; and
(6) recognize that the selection of specific technical hardware and software information security solutions should be left to individual agencies from among commercially developed products.
Editorial notes U.S. Code · Office of the Law Revision Counsel
Effective Date
Pub. L. 107–347, title IV, §402(b), Dec. 17, 2002, 116 Stat. 2962, provided that: “Title III [see Short Title of 2002 Amendments note set out under section 101 of this title] and this title [enacting provisions set out as a note under section 3601 of this title] shall take effect on the date of enactment of this Act [Dec. 17, 2002].”