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Public Private Partnerships to Combat Ransomware: An inquiry into three case studies and best practices

Public Private Partnerships to Combat Ransomware: An inquiry into three case studies and best practices

IST, in collaboration with the Global Forum on Cyber Expertise and in support of the International Counter Ransomware Initiative, examines three existing public-private partnerships to combat ransomware: Europol’s European Cybercrime Centre (EC3), the United States Joint Cyber Defense Collaborative (JCDC), and the Institute for Security and Technology’s Ransomware Task Force (RTF). What challenges did they face? What does an ideal public-private partnership look like?

CISA, cyber, EC3, European Cybercrime Centre, JCDC, Joint Cyber Defense Collaborative, PPPs, Public-private partnerships, Ransomware

March 27, 2024

Unlocking U.S. Technological Competitiveness: Public-Private Misalignments in Biotechnology, Energy, and Quantum Sectors

Unlocking U.S. Technological Competitiveness: Public-Private Misalignments in Biotechnology, Energy, and Quantum Sectors

This initial Strategic Balancing Initiative report summarizes key takeaways from Working Group discussions with stakeholders in the biotechnology, quantum, and energy industries, identifying the unique challenges that they face to improving U.S. competitiveness in each respective sector. The report then engages in a ‘deep dive’ on a key concept from each industry that, if actioned, would improve innovation and could ultimately drive U.S. competitiveness.

biotech, China, energy, public-private misalignments, quantum, techno-industrial competition

February 20, 2024

How Does Access Impact Risk? Assessing AI Foundation Model Risk Along a Gradient of Access

How Does Access Impact Risk? Assessing AI Foundation Model Risk Along a Gradient of Access

Uninhibited access to powerful AI models and their components significantly increases the risk these models pose across a range of categories, as well as the ability for malicious actors to abuse AI capabilities and cause harm.

artificial inteligence, bias, capability overhang, compliance failure, foundation model, human out of the loop, LLMs, malicious use, risk-mitigation

December 13, 2023

Strengthening Resilience in 21st Century Crisis Communications

Strengthening Resilience in 21st Century Crisis Communications

In Strengthening Resilience in 21st Century Crisis Communications, authors Alexa Wehsener and Sylvia Mishra draw on insight from a group of high-level policymakers, diplomats, and technical experts in attendance at IST's London workshop earlier this year to examine the vulnerabilities of existing crisis communications channels and offer possible solutions.

after action report, CATALINK, diplomacy, nuclear, nuclear risk reduction

July 20, 2023

Mapping Threat Actor Behavior in the Ransomware Payment Ecosystem: A Mini-Pilot

Mapping Threat Actor Behavior in the Ransomware Payment Ecosystem: A Mini-Pilot

This mini-pilot overlays actual threat actor behavior on the original ransomware payment ecosystem map. It seeks to identify which kinds of disruption could be the most effective and where to apply them in the payment process.

cybersecurity, mini pilot, ransom payments, Ransomware

May 22, 2023

Castles Built on Sand: Towards Securing the Open-Source Software Ecosystem

Castles Built on Sand: Towards Securing the Open-Source Software Ecosystem

Castles Built on Sand advocates for a fundamental shift in the open-source software ecosystem. Taking the Log4j vulnerability as a case study, the paper seeks to understand the documentation of its development, the transparent response and mitigation efforts at each stage of the disclosure cycle, and its ongoing exploitation.

cybersecurity, Log4j, open source software, vulnerability management

April 17, 2023

Cyber Incident Reporting Framework: Global Edition

Cyber Incident Reporting Framework: Global Edition

Multiple industry groups, led by the Cyber Threat Alliance and IST, have come together to identify a set of principles and develop a model reporting format that governments worldwide could use. The Cyber Incident Reporting Framework: Global Edition answers questions about what conditions should be in place to make a reporting mandate effective and harmonizes suggested definitions with existing global regulations.

CIRCIA, CISA, cybersecurity, incident reporting

March 9, 2023

AI-NC3 Integration in an Adversarial Context: Strategic Stability Risks and Confidence Building Measures

AI-NC3 Integration in an Adversarial Context: Strategic Stability Risks and Confidence Building Measures

AI-NC3 Integration in an Adversarial Context aims to examine the strategic stability risks posed by integrating AI technologies into nuclear command, control and communications systems across the globe.

and communications, artificial intelligence, confidence-building measures, control, NC3, nuclear command

February 27, 2023

Nuclear Crisis Communications: Mapping Risk Reduction Implementation Pathways

Nuclear Crisis Communications: Mapping Risk Reduction Implementation Pathways

Nuclear Crisis Communications: Mapping Risk Reduction Implementation Pathways underscores the importance of nuclear risk reduction and the growing need for modern crisis communications and outlines two scalable pathways to integrate a crisis communications system like CATALINK.

CATALINK, crisis communications, nuclear risk reduction, P5

January 23, 2023

Towards a Stronger Ukrainian Media Ecosystem

Towards a Stronger Ukrainian Media Ecosystem

As Russian troops and military equipment surged on the border with Ukraine in 2021, IST used data gathered by VAST-OSINT Technologies to identify emerging narratives in Russian and Ukrainian across Ukraine’s media ecosystem. IST was able to pinpoint the origins of Russian disinformation narratives before they became mainstream and to provide timely insights to counter those narratives.

disinformation, media ecosystem, Russia, Ukraine

December 14, 2022

To the Point of Failure: Identifying Failure Points for Crisis Communications Systems

To the Point of Failure: Identifying Failure Points for Crisis Communications Systems

Crisis communication systems can fail in a variety of ways. To shed light on the many different failures that degrade and undermine such systems, this report identifies four categories of pathways to failure: operational failures, adversarial failures, accidental failures and institutional failures. Each category is made up of specific types of failures, investigated in further detail in the following sections of this report.

NC3, nuclear crisis communications, nuclear risk reduction, points of failure

November 30, 2022

Mapping the Ransomware Payment Ecosystem: A Comprehensive Visualization of the Process and Participants

Mapping the Ransomware Payment Ecosystem: A Comprehensive Visualization of the Process and Participants

Central to our ability to mitigate the threat of ransomware is the development of a common understanding of the actors, stakeholders, processes, and information, both required for and produced during the ransomware payment process. Yet, when we began this work, such a picture did not exist. We undertook this effort to fill that gap.

mapping, ransom payments, Ransomware, visualization

November 15, 2022

Plan maestro de defensa contra los programas de secuestro

Plan maestro de defensa contra los programas de secuestro

En respuesta a la acción 3.1.1 del Informe del Grupo de Trabajo sobre Programas de Secuestro, en la cual se exhorta a las organizaciones de ciberseguridad a establecer un marco claro y accionable para la mitigación, la respuesta y la recuperación ante programas de secuestro, el Grupo de Trabajo encargado de elaborar un plan de defensa contra los programas de secuestro formuló un plan maestro que abarca un subconjunto de salvaguardias esenciales de ciberhigiene seleccionadas de los controles críticos de seguridad del Centro para la Seguridad de Internet (CIS Controls®) v8.

Blueprint for Ransomware Defense, cyber attacks, defense, Future of Digital Security, Ransomware, RTF

November 10, 2022

Cyber Incident Reporting Framework

Cyber Incident Reporting Framework

The Framework lays out a set of model reporting formats the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) could use as the foundation for the cyber incident reporting.

CIRCIA, cyber, cybersecurity, incident reporting, Ransomware

November 3, 2022

Digital Tools, Cognition, and Democracy: A Review of the Literature

Digital Tools, Cognition, and Democracy: A Review of the Literature

This literature review supports a series examining the effects digital technologies have on the following cognitive processes: "Memory," "Attention," and "Reasoning." The broader report series includes three additional papers looking at some of the society-level cognitive and democratic impacts of technology, titled: "Modulating Trust," "Shortcutting Critical Thinking," and "Exploiting Emotions."

attention, cognition, DCDI, democracy, emotions, Geopolitics of Technology, memory, reasoning, social

October 27, 2022

Reasoning: How digital technologies influence decision making and judgment

Reasoning: How digital technologies influence decision making and judgment

This report provides a working definition of reasoning, narrowing the scope of the discussion to judgment and decision making. We identify three aspects of digital technology that exert significant impacts on reasoning: user experience design, gamification, and search engines. Examples include social media platforms, gamified platforms like Robinhood, and search engines like Google and Wikipedia. Key findings include:

cognition, DCDI, decision making, democracy, gamification, Geopolitics of Technology, judgment, reasoning, search engines, user experience design

October 27, 2022