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Today's cyber environment presents unlimited opportunities for innovation, interaction, commerce, and creativity, but these benefits also bring serious security challenges. Satisfactory solutions will require building partnerships among public and private organizations, establishing mechanisms and incentives to foster routine information sharing and collective defense, and educating users about their role in thwarting increasingly sophisticated attacks. With a grant from the William and Flora Hewlett Foundation's Cyber Initiative, RAND developed and conducted two cybersecurity-focused discovery games in Washington, D.C., and California's Silicon Valley that aimed to capture the widest possible range of stakeholder perspectives. Participants represented the tech sector, government agencies, think tanks and academic institutions, advocacy organizations promoting civil liberties and privacy, technology users, and more. The goals were to explore opportunities for improving cybersecurity, assess the implications of possible solutions, and develop an initial framework to support debate and inform decisions regarding cybersecurity policies and practices. The games were structured around two plausible cybersecurity scenarios set in the near future. In the first scenario, malicious actors have exploited vulnerabilities in the Internet of Things, causing both virtual and physical harm; in the second, massive data breaches have compromised the financial system, including authentication processes. Participants debated dimensions of each problem in multidisciplinary teams, then shared potential solutions and strategies in a large-group setting. The format and findings of the exercises offer insights that can help guide holistic approaches to addressing future cybersecurity challenges.
Key Findings
Cybersecurity Suffers from a Lack of Demand in the Market
Participants saw few incentives to encourage cybersecurity best practices among technology producers or to educate consumers on their role in protecting their personal data. Participants agreed that data breaches and other exploits unfairly burden consumers. Policies to remedy this imbalance would shift the consequences toward technology developers or producers, as well as penalize attackers.
Participants saw a need for market forces to reward security and penalize insecurity. They identified a role for government in classifying products by degree of cybersecurity (assessed through certifications or performance standards). They also agreed that cybersecurity should be prioritized according to the impact of failure, with health and safety devices being the most critical targets for regulation.
Effective Solutions to Cybersecurity Challenges Consider the Interests of a Range of Stakeholders
Participants saw a need for public-private partnerships in any successful solution to cybersecurity challenges. However, the focus of these partnerships differed with the games' locations. For example, Washington participants saw a greater role for government in implementing additional protections. Silicon Valley participants were more likely highlight the tech sector's role in changing its business practices to prioritize security.
Participants in both games saw the entire system for establishing identity and authenticating transactions as fundamentally broken. They agreed that overuse and overreliance on documents and credentials not created for these purposes (such as Social Security numbers) was a fundamental cybersecurity weakness. Proposed solutions highlighted a need for flexibility in authentication. Participants also suggested empowering consumers to selectively freeze and unfreeze certain types of financial transactions.
Recommendations
Develop cybersecurity standards and certifications, including identification standards that can improve the security of online transactions.
Implement a bill of user's rights to help users make informed cybersecurity decisions when purchasing devices.
Encourage information sharing between government and industry, and within these sectors, to facilitate action against cybersecurity vulnerabilities and exploits.
Provide financial incentives for improved cybersecurity, such as through programs that incentivize users to replace obsolete and potentially vulnerable devices.
Direct government funding toward developing effective cybersecurity standards and achieving compliance in an affordable manner.
Educate consumers, through public awareness campaigns or school curricula, on cyber risk and cybersecurity best practices.
Develop a system of security labeling, similar to food nutrition labels, to allow consumers to compare technology products side by side.
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