The members of the International Counter Ransomware Initiative (CRI) recently engaged in a 2-day summit at the White House to reaffirm their continued commitment to combat ransomware, counter illicit finance, and collaboratively improve cybersecurity resilience.
With a universal push to combat malicious ransomware actors, the CRI objectives are designed to align national law and policy with the relevant member countries, including Australia. This will not only require public sector cooperation but also participation from private sector companies, particularly those dealing with cybersecurity. As such, five working groups have been established under the CRI, including:
- Resilience
- Diplomacy
- Disruption
- Countering illicit financing, and
- Public-private partnership.
To achieve the goals within these working groups, the member countries of the CRI have committed to the following goals:
- Establish an International Counter Ransomware Task Force (ICRTF), with Australia as the inaugural chair and coordinator
- Establish a dedicated cybersecurity team through a combination of relevant member agencies at the Regional Cyber Defence Centre in Lithuania, to assess a scaled adoption of the ICRTF
- Create and deliver an investigator’s toolkit providing lessons and strategies concerning the recommended responses to significant ransomware issues, managing cybercriminals, and allocating resources to mitigate ransomware attacks
- Secure active private-sector partnerships to promote capacity-building and information sharing between operators
- Participate in a second counter-illicit finance ransomware workshop to enhance capacity on blockchain tracing and analytics.
For a full reading of the White House’s media release, see here.
