ENISA calls for better data sharing and interoperability among “Digital Fire Brigades” to mitigate cyber attacks in new report; “Detect, SHARE, Protect”

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Press Release Nov 20,2013

The EU Agency ENISA launches its new report “Detect, SHARE, Protection: Improving Threat Data Exchange among CERTs” on how to make data threat exchange easier and better between the “digital fire brigades” (i.e. Computer Emergency Response Teams (CERT)s.) The Agency concludes that improving information sharing must build on existing solutions and standardisation efforts in data exchange formats, so as to make them interoperable.

Despite fruitful cooperation, CERTs still face obstacles when it comes to the smooth exchange and sharing of security information. Legal and technical barriers as well as lack of interest from cybersecurity stakeholders regarding the sharing of information represent the  key problems for the effective exchange of information.

The Executive Director of ENISA, Professor Udo Helmbrecht commented: “The increasing complexity of cyber-attacks requires more effective cross-border information sharing among Computer Emergency Response Teams. Effective information sharing saves time and effort in incident response and post-mortem analysis. It also increases synergies and aligns the best practices among the CERTs.”

Local detection, accompanied by trusted forms of information exchange, leads to the global prevention of cyber-attacks. It is thus very beneficial for the successful identification and subsequent handling of an incident, if it has already been detected by CERTs sharing this information, and this information is shared. Moreover, much progress has been made recently in establishing national/governmental (n/g) CERTs in Europe to coordinate responses to cyber-attacks. As cyber-attacks are often global, it is crucial that incident responses are coordinated not only within national boundaries, but also on an international level. Therefore, secure and effective exchange of information  concerning such incidents must take place. The report identifies the emerging tools and standards that would help CERTs with the efficient sharing of strategic incident information. ENISA has identified a set of recommendations for the CERT community and other security actors for better data exchange practices:

  • Facilitating adoption, interoperability and enhancing functionalities of Essential Tools for the CERT Community
  • Promoting the stability and continuity of incident feeds, which are often changed without prior notice
  • Promoting the use of standards for data exchange
  • Enhancing the functionality of existing tools regarding:
    • Interoperability
    • Automated incident correlation analysis
    • Improved threat intelligence
    • Advanced analytics and visualisation for massive numbers of incidents

 

The European Union, including ENISA, helps (n/g) CERTs in the process to facilitate the exchange among them of information on incidents. In 2014, ENISA will actively engage in supporting community driven projects helping CERTs to collaborate more efficiently.

For full report; Detect, SHARE, Protect

For interviews; Ulf Bergström, Spokesman, ulf.bergstrom@enisa.europa.eu, mobile: + 30 6948 460 143, or Romain Bourgue, Expert,

 

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