Much of our daily lives, from banking to turning on the lights, would be impossible if the elaborate infrastructure that powers the Internet wasn’t available. However, unlike the electric grill OR financial institutionsThere is no single entity responsible for maintaining and protecting the Internet.
Instead, that task falls to a diverse group of organizations and individuals who preserve this public utility poor funding or subsistence on tight budgets. The stakes are incredibly high, but the amount of resources available to keep this infrastructure secure is insufficient.
“Everyone thinks it’s someone else’s responsibility,” says Philip Reitinger, president and CEO of the Global Cyber Alliance. “We agree that cybersecurity requires a whole-of-society effort, but the challenge for us is that there is so little funding available to keep the Internet reliable and secure.”
Exploring a new financing model
In an effort to combat this dilution of responsibility and paucity of financial support, global policymakers and representatives of non-profit, philanthropic and fundraising organizations recently launched Common Good Cyber, an initiative aimed at building sustainable funding models to support those who protect the Internet for all. . These stakeholders also took part in a February workshop in Washington, DC, to discuss the critical role of resource-limited organizations safeguarding the Internet. The workshop highlighted the need for collaboration and alignment in funding efforts to support cybersecurity initiatives.
“Key components of the Internet are operated by volunteers, nonprofits, NGOs and others working with meager budgets and resources,” he said Kemba Waldenpresident of the Paladin Global Institute and former acting US national chief information officer keynote speech at the workshop. “Consider this: the foundation of our digital infrastructure, the infrastructure that allows civil society to thrive in our economy today and grow, rests on a network of volunteers, nonprofits, NGOs and others.
The goal of Common Good Cyber is to find new ways to integrate adequate funding into legislation and policy, corporate and government policies, and other funding vehicles sufficient to meet the common need for cybersecurity. Supporting organizations include the Cyber Civil Defense Initiative, the Global Cyber Alliance, the Cyber Threat Alliance, the CyberPeace Institute, the Forum of Incident Response and Security Teams, the Institute for Security and Technology, and Shadowserver Foundation.
Craig Newmark, philanthropist and founder of Craigslist and the Cyber civil protection initiativestates that funding and supporting Internet safety projects is a patriotic duty.
“So many people have sacrificed a lot to defend all of us. I pushed people like those at the Global Cyber Alliance, those at the Aspen cybersecurity group, and those at Consumer Reports” says Newmark, listing three organizations that are part of the Cyber Civil Defense Initiative. “The idea is that we work together – to fight the battle together – to complement what the government does, kind of like my parents did during the world war. II, when everyone was expected to play a role.”
While governments can do some things very well, there are some areas where government can’t do all the work and citizens need to step up, Newmark adds.
“People like me who consider themselves true patriots, have to help the people who do the actual work, who sometimes sacrifice a lot,” he says. “In my case, while I’m trying to figure out how to mobilize the whole country, it’s time to fund some organizations that will do the hard, boring work, trying to figure out how regular people can protect themselves.”
For Newmark, the biggest challenge is getting the message out and getting people to take action.
“The message is the hardest part: working together to protect the country,” he said. “We need to protect our water and electricity resources and our transportation. We need to work together to make these things actually happen, and I think that’s a great contribution of Common Good Cyber.”
Four actions to take
Four workable ideas emerged from the workshop, says Reitinger.
Participants will seek to create joint funding organizations that have the capacity to raise money from multiple organizations and distribute it through a governance mechanism to organizations in need. Funding sources could come from government or private entities, she says, and be modeled after organizations that fight infectious diseases such as HIV or malaria.
In keeping with the common fund concept, nonprofits could be linked for federated fundraising, “kind of like the United Way,” Reitinger says. The fund could then be split among the nonprofit entities, giving each “a little more bang for the buck and a little stronger overall message.”
Common Good Cyber also wants organizations to work together to build their business case by collecting data who is doing what to support the Internet infrastructure. There’s a real need to understand the size of the industry “and the value that all these organizations provide… I think that’s going to be essential,” Reitinger says. “The business case says this is what this infrastructure does.”
Creating a hub or accelerator for provide resources to the groups that protect the Internet was the last piece of the puzzle discussed. “All these nonprofits doing critical work have to start from scratch,” Reitinger says. “And there are some resources that they can tap into. But maybe let’s start aggregating them so we can help nonprofits do things like fundraising. Everyone wants to use money as effectively as possible. So let’s make it a little more simple to do.” .”
Common Good Cyber’s next steps include producing a report on the workshop and speaking at this year’s one RSA conference in San Francisco and a workshop in Europe in October. The group hopes to have a set of solutions implemented that people can rely on in about a year.
“This is a problem that really needs to be solved, because we all suffer from inadequate cybersecurity funding to support the common good. Cybersecurity really needs to be a basic human right,” says Rettinger. “It’s just a problem that really needs a solution, and I hope we can continue to get the attention of government, industry and nonprofit stakeholders. It’s not going to get better on its own. It’s going to get worse.”