WASHINGTON, February 19, 2020 – The Cyber Threat Alliance today announced the publication of its first joint Threat Assessment, focusing on the 2020 Olympics. This report provides a summary of the threat environment facing the 2020 Olympics as well as recommendations for the Tokyo Organizing Committee as they prepare for the games. The Threat Assessment will help focus CTA members’ information sharing activities for the Games and will enable members to develop planning scenarios based on the threat landscape. Here are some of the highlights from the report:
- Nation-state actors pose the highest threat and are most likely to conduct disruptive attacks and disinformation campaigns against the Olympics.
- This includes targeted data leaks, disruption of events with DDoS attacks, compromising systems with ransomware, or affecting physical infrastructure.
- Based on historical targeting of the Olympics, CTA assesses that anti-doping agencies and experts and services supporting the game’s operations and logistics (such as wi-fi networks and ticketing systems) are also at high risk of compromise.
- Other targets could include tourists and spectators, supply chain and infrastructure providers, and Japanese officials and partner governments.
- Cyber-criminals will be highly active due to the large number of potential victims. We are already seeing cyber-enabled scams and other criminal activity.
- CTA recommends that the Organizing Committee, Japanese government, and other entities supporting the Olympics focus their current efforts on implementing best practices, information sharing, coordinated planning around cybersecurity incidents, and regular examination of critical systems.
CTA recommends that anyone with responsibility for Olympics-related cybersecurity review this report for actions to further improve their security posture. Our recommendations apply not just to the Olympics, but also to any major event in which governments, companies, and corporate sponsors are involved, and which heads of state, executives, and networks defenders, must plan for and support.
This CTA Threat Assessment report showcases the value of the industry collaborating to solve the big cyber problems of today. You can download the full Threat Assessment report here: CTA 2020 Olympics Threat Assessment Report (revised April 2021)
“As part of our sharing activities, CTA enables member companies to work together on developing reports like these, not just on a one-time basis, but in a sustained manner over time. The resulting analysis is much stronger because it comes from such a wide array of viewpoints. We look forward to producing more of these assessments in the future,” said Michael Daniel, President and Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of CTA.
Cyber Threat Alliance Continues to Grow
Today we are also announcing SonicWall has joined as a new CTA member. By joining CTA, they will work with other leading security companies to share actionable threat intelligence at speed and scale to collaboratively disrupt malicious cyber activity and improve our collective global defenses. CTA recently celebrated its third anniversary, and over the last three years, our members have shared over 5TB of highly curated threat intelligence. That’s nearly 68 million observables with the context to help our members better protect their customers.
“We’re very excited to have SonicWall join CTA. They will bring another perspective to our shared intelligence and bolster our efforts to raise the level of cybersecurity across the digital ecosystem,” said Daniel. “It’s heartening to see more and more companies realizing that joining an organization like CTA makes you even more competitive in today’s environment.”
“Today’s threat landscape mandates a real-time view of threat activity and rapid response to effectively stop even the most elusive of cyberattacks. We look forward to collaborating with the Cyber Threat Alliance, combining years of security experience and leveraging resources to effectively tackle today’s cyber challenges,” said Atul Dhablania, Senior Vice President and Chief Operating Officer of SonicWall.
About the Cyber Threat Alliance
The Cyber Threat Alliance (CTA), founded by Check Point Software Technologies Ltd., Cisco, Fortinet, McAfee, Palo Alto Networks, and Symantec, is an independent, not-for-profit organization that also includes AlienVault, NETSCOUT Arbor, Dragos, IntSights, Juniper Networks, K7 Computing, Lastline, NEC Corporation, NTT Security, Panda Security, Radware, Rapid7, ReversingLabs, Scitum, SecureBrain, SK Infosec, SonicWall, Sophos, Telefónica’s ElevenPaths, and Verizon. CTA is the industry’s first formally organized group of cybersecurity practitioners that work together in good faith to share threat information and improve global defenses against advanced cyber adversaries. CTA’s mission is to facilitate the sharing of actionable intelligence and situational awareness about sophisticated cyber threats to improve its members’ cyber defenses, more effectively disrupt malicious cyber actors around the world and raise the level of cybersecurity throughout the Internet and cyberspace. The alliance is continuing to grow on a global basis, enriching both the quantity and quality of the information that is being shared across the platform. CTA is actively recruiting additional regional players to enhance information sharing to enable a more secure future for all.
Media Contact pr@cyberthreatalliance.org
About SonicWall
SonicWall has been fighting the cybercriminal industry for over 28 years defending small and medium businesses, enterprises and government agencies worldwide. Backed by research from SonicWall Capture Labs, our award-winning, real-time breach detection and prevention solutions secure more than a million networks, and their emails, applications and data, in over 215 countries and territories. These organizations run more effectively and fear less about security. For more information, visit www.sonicwall.com