WASHINGTON – Yesterday, President Obama announced a series of new legislative proposals designed to ratchet up cybersecurity protections in the wake of a massive data breaches, warning that the growing problem of online attacks "costs us billions of dollars.

In a speech at the Federal Trade Commission, the President unveiled the Personal Data Notification and Protection Act, a proposed bill that would require all corporations to notify consumers within a month if their personal information had been exposed in a data breach. The proposal would also criminalize the overseas trade of identify information and would attempt to standardize the individual state privacy laws that currently govern data beach notifications.

It's confusing for consumers and it's consuming for companies, and it's costly too to have to comply with this patchwork of laws," Obama said during his announcement.

Yesterday’s announcements were part of a weeklong focus on cybersecurity by the president. Later today, the President is expected to discuss the legislative proposals with a bipartisan, bicameral group of congressional leaders meeting at the White House. He also plans to discuss efforts to increase cybersecurity information sharing between private sector firms and the government. The White House hopes that it can use government to facilitate a better exchange of methods to combat cyber security. Congress has for years been debating the Cyber Intelligence Sharing and Protection Act (CISPA) legislation, which would provide businesses liability protection that would facilitate the sharing of cybersecurity information between the government and private sector companies. The companies that participate would receive liability protections.