CEO Succession at the Internet Society – Status update (Feb 2018)
This is a status update on where we are in the CEO search process. In my last note to the community, I explained that we were finishing the selection of a search firm to support us during the process and that we were planning to launch an open call for candidates in February.
After issuing an RFP and conducting a set of interviews with several firms, the CEO Search Committee selected a search firm. The selected firm is Perrett Laver.
Based on, among other things, all the community feedback we have received on the following email address (you can still send your input to that address), the CEO Search Committee has developed a draft job description:
In order to refine the job description and to make sure we gather all the input we need, the search firm is going to conduct informational interviews with the leadership of our communities. Accordingly, they are going to interview the chairs of the OMAC (Organization Advisory Council), the ChAC (Chapters Advisory Council), and the IETF (the chairs of the IAB and the IAOC will also be interviewed). ISOC’s executive team (staff) will also be interviewed. You can also talk with Continue reading
International Cooperation Needed to Create an “Increasingly Beneficial Internet”
New norms of behavior are needed for Internet users, and it’s time for governments, companies, other organizations, and individuals to work together to define those standards, Internet advocates say.
Even as the Internet gives more and more people new ways to express themselves and improve their standard of living, it also creates problems that demand international and multistakeholder cooperation, speakers at the Global Internet and Jurisdiction Conference 2018 in Ottawa, Canada, said Monday.
The Internet has driven forward the ideas of globalization and equal opportunity for everyone, but technological advances have also created complexity that many people weren’t prepared for, said Kathy Brown, president and CEO of Internet Society.
“We now face enormous challenges as the pace of change has accelerated faster than did our human institutions, societal and existing global agreements,” she said during the first day of the conference.
Many governments have looked toward heavy regulation and censorship as a way to deal with this complex environment, Brown added.
Governments in some countries “are doubling down on what they know how to do — shut it down, shut it off, censor users, regulate creators,” she added. “The global Internet community, itself, is in danger of splintering into predictable commercial, Continue reading
Raúl Echeberría at Mobile World Congress Ministerial Programme
The Internet Society’s Vice President of Global Engagement Raúl Echeberría will be participating in a panel tomorrow at the Mobile World Congress Ministerial Programme on Policies to Expand Access to Mobile:
“Access to mobile services has become a key prerequisite for advancing societies where connectivity has almost become a human right. As 4G continues to be rolled out in most markets, and with 5G on the horizon, what policy levers can be pulled to extend existing and future mobile broadband services further into rural and other underserved areas?
“Adopting a balanced regulatory framework that is pro-investment and pro-innovation, will help address some of the toughest development challenges for the mobile industry. This interactive session will discuss policymakers’ key objectives for supporting mobile sector growth, and their next steps for attracting investment which deliver benefits not only for the mobile industry, but for the digitalisation of other industries.”
The panel, which takes place on Tuesday, 27 February, from 11:30-13:00 (CET), is moderated by Julian David, CEO of techUK, and includes, among others, Ebele Okobi, Facebook’s Public Policy Director, Africa; Francesca Bria, Chief Technology and Digital Innovation Officer of Barcelona City Council; and Nkateko Cornelius Nyoka, Chief Legal and Regulatory Officer of Vodacom Group Continue reading
The Week in Internet News: Blockchain Fights Slavery in the Seafood Industry
Blockchain vs. slavery: Provenance, a London NGO, is using Blockchain to add transparency to seafood supply chains, in an effort to reduce the practice of slavery in the seafood industry in Southeast Asia. Blockchain can create end-to-end traceability for seafood products by storing data on all kinds of transactional history. This can help NGOs track suppliers using slaves and abusive employment practices, reports Forbes.
AI joins the HR team: Artificial Intelligence may soon be assisting human resources departments, Inc. reports. Spoke, an AI startup, learns information about the deploying company and answers worker questions through a chatbot. Companies installing Spoke can program it with answers to the most-asked employee questions, but then the service can learn more about the company as time goes on. The Spoke software can also handle meeting room requests and equipment reservations, and it can prioritize IT requests.
The dark side of AI: Many AI experts are concerned about its malicious uses, including the sci-fi sounding scenarios of swarms of micro drones and autonomous weapons. Using AI to automate security tasks could also expand existing surveillance, persuasion, and deception threats, according to a new report, detailed on CNBC.com and in Motherboard.
Can SIM cards improve Continue reading
Improving Routing Security: Introducing Six New MANRS Tutorials
Routing outages or attacks – such as hijacking, leaks, and spoofing – can lead to stolen data, lost revenue, reputational damage and more, all on a global scale. Routing security is therefore vital to the future and stability of the Internet, and the Mutually Agreed Norms for Routing Security (MANRS) initiative implements crucial fixes. Today, we are pleased to announce a series of six new MANRS tutorials that will help network operators improve both the Internet’s routing security and their own network’s operational efficiency.
These tutorials are intended for network administrators, network engineers, and others with a working knowledge of routing and security who are looking for steps to improve their network’s routing security and to join the growing list of MANRS participants.
About the Tutorials
Module 1: Introduction to MANRS
What is MANRS, and why should you join? MANRS is a global initiative to implement crucial fixes needed to eliminate the most common routing threats. In this module you will learn about vulnerabilities of the Internet routing system and how four simple steps, called MANRS Actions, can help dramatically improve Internet security and reliability.
Module 2: IRRs, RPKI, and PeeringDB
This module helps you understand the databases and repositories Continue reading
The Cost of Cybercrime
Most people paying attention would expect that the cost of cybercrime has gone up in recent years. But a new report has put a number on it: Worldwide cybercrime costs an estimated $600 billion USD a year.
That’s up from $500 billion USD in 2014, the last time security vendor McAfee and think tank the Center for Strategic and International Studies released a similar study. The new estimate amounts to 0.8 percent of global GDP, up from 0.7 percent in 2014.
“Cybercrime is relentless, undiminished, and unlikely to stop,” writes report author James Lewis, senior vice president at CSIS. “It is just too easy and too rewarding, and the chances of being caught and punished are perceived as being too low.”
Lewis points to poorly-protected IoT devices as a particular problem. Insecure IoT devices “provide new, easy approaches to steal personal information or gain access to valuable data or networks,” he writes. They also power botnets that can create massive denial-of-service attacks.
Among the other reasons for the growth in the cost of cybercrime:
- Cybercriminals are embracing new attack technologies.
- Many new Internet users come from countries with weak cybersecurity.
- Online crime is becoming easier through cybercrime-as-a-service Continue reading
Future Thinking: Niel Harper on Cyber Threats
In 2017, the Internet Society unveiled the 2017 Global Internet Report: Paths to Our Digital Future. The interactive report identifies the drivers affecting tomorrow’s Internet and their impact on Media & Society, Digital Divides, and Personal Rights & Freedoms. In February 2018, we interviewed two stakeholders – Cyrating, a cybersecurity ratings agency, and Niel Harper, Senior Manager, Next Generation Leaders at the Internet Society – to hear their different perspectives on the forces shaping the Internet.
Niel Harper is a Young Global Leader at the World Economic Forum. He has more than 20 years of experience in the areas of telecoms management, cybersecurity, IT governance and strategy, ICT policy research and advisory services, and program management. (You can read Cyrating’s interview here).
The Internet Society: Experts predict an increase of frequency and impact of cyberattacks. What form are they likely to take in the future?
Niel Harper: In the foreseeable future, attackers are likely to fall under three categories: organized criminals seeking to profit from malicious online activities, online protesters (also known as hacktivists), and governments who target their own citizens or target other governments, whether for cyberespionage or cyberwarfare.
Criminals will continue to become more organized, selling Continue reading
Future Thinking: Cyrating on Cyber Threats
In 2017, the Internet Society unveiled the 2017 Global Internet Report: Paths to Our Digital Future. The interactive report identifies the drivers affecting tomorrow’s Internet and their impact on Media & Society, Digital Divides, and Personal Rights & Freedoms. In February 2018, we interviewed two stakeholders – Cyrating, a cybersecurity ratings agency, and Niel Harper, Senior Manager, Next Generation Leaders at the Internet Society – to hear their different perspectives on the forces shaping the Internet’s future.
Cyrating is the first cybersecurity ratings agency anchored in Europe, and helps forward-thinking organizations maximize their cybersecurity performance and investments. It identifies potential for improvement, benchmarks it against industry best practices, and provides standardized cybersecurity metrics. We spoke to François Gratiolet, one of Cyrating’s founders, about the future of a secure and trusted Internet.
(You can read Niel Harper’s interview here).
The Internet Society: Experts predict an increase of frequency and impact of cyberattacks. What form are they likely to take in the next three to five years?
François Gratiolet: We believe cyberattacks will intensify in the next three to five years; targeting both Internet users and the Internet’s underlying infrastructure. User attacks will move from phishing to social media, with Continue reading
FIRST/TF-CSIRT: The Changing Face of Cybersecurity
The Internet Society was recently approved as a Liaison Member of TF-CSIRT, the European Forum for Computer Security Incident Response Teams, and therefore took the opportunity to participate in the FIRST/TF-CSIRT Symposium that was held 5-7 February 2018 in Hamburg, Germany.
The Internet Society continues to support organisations and activities concerned with maintaining the safety, stability and security of the Internet, and our colleague Kevin Meynell is already known within the TF-CSIRT community having run the forum between 2008 and 2012 and overseen its transition from a grouping of primarily academic CSIRTs to a wider industry body encompassing more than 160 National, Government, Military and Commercial CSIRTs, as well as those in academia.
TF-CSIRT meets three times per year, but starting in 2008 the first meeting of the year has always been held jointly with FIRST, the global Forum of Incident Response and Security Teams. This provides an opportunity for the European CSIRTs to meet with their counterparts around the world to exchange information, and develop the networks of trust that are critical to effective cooperation in handling cyber incidents when they occur, but also in development of early warning and prevention techniques.
And a number of the presentations had particular Continue reading
NDSS 2018: Automating the Process of Vulnerability Discovery
NDSS 2018 is in full swing in San Diego this week and a couple of papers that really grabbed my attention were both in the same session on Network Security and Cellular Networks yesterday.
Samuel Jero, a PhD student at Purdue University and past IRTF Applied Networking Research Prize Winner, presented a fascinating paper on “Automated Attack Discovery in TCP Congestion Control Using a Model-guided Approach”. Of the many protocols and algorithms that are in daily use on the Internet, some are more fundamental and important than others and it doesn’t get much more fundamental and important than TCP congestion control.
TCP congestion control is what makes it possible for millions of autonomous devices and networks to seamlessly, and more-or-less fairly, share available bandwidth. Without it the network would literally collapse.
Attacks against congestion control to manipulate senders’ or receivers’ understanding of the state of the network have been known for some time. Jero and his co-authors Endadul Hoque, David Choffnes, Alan Mislove and Cristina Nita-Rotaru developed an approach using model-based testing to address the scalability challenges of previous work to automate the discovery of manipulation attacks against congestion control algorithms.
By building abstract models of several congestion Continue reading
The Future of Online Privacy and Personal Data Protection in Africa
African experts are gathered for two days (19-20 February 2018) in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia to contribute to the development of the African Privacy and Personal Data Protection Guidelines. The meeting, facilitated by the African Union Commission (AUC) and supported by Internet Society, explored the future of privacy and data protection and provided some practical suggestions that African states can consider in implementing the Malabo convention provisions related to online privacy. The guidelines are aimed at empowering citizens, as well as establishing legal certainty for stakeholders through clear and uniform personal data protection rules for the region.
The expert meeting comes amidst growing concern across the world on the need to prepare for the EU General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR), which will be enforced on 25 May 2018. The expert meeting is rather focused on creating general principles for African member states in developing good practices now and in the future. The project, a partnership of the AUC and the Internet Society, comes as a follow up to the recommendations of the Africa Infrastructure Security Guidelines, developed in 2017 to assist speed up their adoption and subsequent ratification of the Malabo Convention.
Both the Heads of States Summit in January Continue reading
Report: Distributed IoT Security and Standards Workshop at NDSS 2018
Network and Distributed Systems Security (NDSS) Symposium is in full swing for its 25th anniversary year. As usual the NDSS program includes a really impressive array of great content on a wide range of topics. Prior to the main event there were four one-day workshops on themes related to the topic of NDSS: Binary Analysis Research, DNS Privacy, Usable Security, and the workshop I’d like to delve into here, Distributed IoT Security and Standards (DISS).
The DISS workshop received 29 submissions and accepted 12 papers. In an interesting twist on the usual scientific workshop format, the presented papers were all still in draft form and will now be revised based on the Q&A and offline discussions that took place as a result of the workshop. Revised papers will be published by the Internet Society in due course.
Introducing proceedings, co-chair Dirk Kutscher explained that it has become evident that the success of the Internet of Things (IoT) depends on sound and usable security and privacy. Device constraints, intermittent network connectivity, the scale of deployments, economic issues all combine to create an interesting and challenging environment for the research community to address.
A decentralised approach to IoT security Continue reading
Busy Week for MANRS, Routing Security, and More at APRICOT 2018
APRICOT 2018 is underway in in Kathmandu, Nepal, and as usual the Internet Society is an active participant in many areas of Asia Pacific’s largest international Internet conference. The workshops are taking place this week, with the conference happening next week. Here are some of the conference activities where we’ll be.
Routing Security BoF
On Sunday, 25 February, from 18:00 to 19:00 (UTC +05:45), Aftab Siddiqui and Andrei Robachevsky will moderate a Birds of a Feather (BoF) session on routing security. From the abstract, the session will provide a space where “…operators can share their approach in securing their own infrastructure and keeping the internet routing table clean as well. Also, this will provide a platform to review and highlight various BCOP documents to address routing security.” The Mutually Agreed Norms for Routing Security (MANRS) initiative is a key piece of the routing security puzzle.
Tech Girls Social
On Monday, 26 February, from 13:00 to 14:00 (UTC +05:45), Salam Yamout will be speaking at the Tech Girls Social. This session provides a space for APRICOT participants to talk and network in an open, friendly environment. The event is open to ANYONE who is interested and is not restricted to Continue reading
Starting Today: NDSS Highlights the Best in Internet Security Research
You’ve undoubtedly heard about all sorts of Internet security vulnerabilities and incidents causing harm around the world, but the flip side of all that doom and gloom is all the promising efforts underway to create a more secure, private, and trusted Internet. Starting today and going through Wednesday (18-21 February), the Network and Distributed Systems Security (NDSS) Symposium takes place to present groundbreaking research in the world of Internet security.
This year marks the 25th anniversary of NDSS, and the Internet Society is proud to have been associated with it for over 20 years now. A key focus of the Internet Society has long been improving trust in the global open Internet. In order to promote this trust, we need new and innovative ideas and research on the security and privacy of our connected devices and the Internet that brings them together. NDSS is a top tier forum for highlighting this research.
NDSS 2018 is four full days featuring:
- Two exciting keynotes from Ari Juels and Parisa Tabriz
- Four workshops on Binary Analysis Research (BAR), Decentralized IoT Security and Standards (DISS), DNS Privacy (DNSPRIV), and Usable Security (USEC).
- A full program of 71 excellent peer-reviewed research papers organized into Continue reading
The Week in Internet News: Can Blockchain Improve IoT?
Blockchain merges with IoT? Could Blockchain technology help the Internet of Things become more resilient? IBM thinks so. The company is exploring ways to use Blockchain to build trust between devices and to accelerate transactions on the IoT. EETimes explores the issue.
Grand Theft IoT: Someone involved in the online community for the video game, “Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas” has spun up a new botnet made up of IoT devices, according to security firm Radware. For the price of $20, the botnet can supposedly launch a 300gbps Distributed Denial of Service attack, reports Motherboard.
AI on the rise: Nearly after of all CIOs have plans to implement artificial intelligence in the future, according to a recent Gartner survey. The IT research firm recommends that companies rolling out AI projects aim low to start, and focus augmenting workers instead of replacing them, according to a story on TechRepublic.
Where the jobs are: For a time, it appeared that actual deployments of Blockchain seemed to be lagging behind the buzz. But that appears to be changing, with Blockchain developers now in high demand, TechCrunch reports. Blockchain jobs are the second fastest growing category in the labor market, with 14 job openings Continue reading
Celebrating the 25th Anniversary of NDSS
This year we are celebrating the 25th anniversary of the Network and Distributed System Security Symposium (NDSS). NDSS is a premier academic research conference addressing a wide range of topics associated with improving trust in the Internet and its connected devices. A key focus of the Internet Society has long been improving trust in the global open Internet. In order to promote this trust, we need new and innovative ideas and research on the security and privacy of our connected devices and the Internet that connects them together.
NDSS 2018 is about to get underway in San Diego, CA (18-21 February). It will be the biggest NDSS symposium yet, featuring 71 peer-reviewed papers, 20 posters, 4 workshops, 2 keynotes, and a co-located research group meeting. Record registration numbers are a key indicator that NDSS 2018 is featuring vital and timely topics. Below are some of the highlights expected in the coming week.
Workshops
This year’s program officially starts with four workshops on Sunday, 18 February. NDSS workshops are organized around a single topic and provide an opportunity for greater dialogue amongst researchers and practitioners in the area. Each of this year’s workshop have dynamic agendas.
Workshop on Binary Analysis Research (BAR) 2018 at NDSS on 18 February
Binary analysis refers to the process where human analysts and/or automated systems scrutinize the underlying code in software to discover, exploit, and defend against malice and vulnerabilities, oftentimes without access to source code. Through protecting legacy software deployed in all types of devices and platforms in the modern world, binary analysis techniques are becoming more and more critical in making our everyday life and our society more secure.
A Workshop on Binary Analysis Research (BAR) will be co-located with the Network and Distributed System Security Symposium (NDSS), and held in San Diego, CA, USA, on February 18, 2018.
The Workshop aims to provide an interaction point for researchers doing work in binary program analysis, with half of the workshop dedicated to traditional paper sessions and the other half to a roundtable discussion among researchers, implementers, and end-users of binary analysis techniques. BAR has attracted attention of many researchers, especially tool and framework authors, who actively work to create cutting-edge techniques and build powerful tools. Here we are happy to announce that eight high-quality academic papers have been accepted to appear in the paper sessions of the workshop, with presenters from both academia and industry. Researchers and authors of several Continue reading
Indigenous Connectivity Summit Participants Share Their Stories
Madeleine Redfern, the mayor of Iqaluit – the largest and only city in Nunavut, Canada – has a colorful way of describing how sparsely populated the territory is. “The seals outnumber the people.” With a population of just over 35,000 people spread out over an arctic 1,750,000 square kilometers, Internet access is a challenge. In fact, according to Redfern, her most favorited tweet was that she couldn’t tweet… because the connection was too slow.
Madeleine Redfern participated in the first ever Indigenous Connectivity Summit last November. She and other participants shared their experience and expertise to help close the connectivity gap in Indigenous communities. Many also sat down for brief interviews with the 1st-Mile Institute, a New Mexico nonprofit that has initiated a local “Broadband for All” program. The videos are now available to watch on the 1st-Mile Institute’s website.
You can also find the videos on the Internet Society’s Indigenet page, which includes resources from the Summit including the presentations, the policy brief Spectrum Approaches for Community Networks, and other ways to get involved!
The post Indigenous Connectivity Summit Participants Share Their Stories appeared first on Internet Society.
Building a Sustainable Community Network in Sarantaporo Greece
For over a year now we in the Sarantaporo.gr Non Profit Organization have been in contact with Internet Society in meetings, over online interactions, and through in-person collaboration with people of the organization who visited our village last summer. From the beginning we saw that Internet Society is an organization which we share a lot of common elements with in terms of vision, and that its network is a natural space for our Community Network to be a part of.
In September 2017 we applied for the Internet Society Beyond the Net Funding Programme to approach the organization more closely and pursue funding to finance our Community Network. We are very happy to announce that our proposal was successful and will be funded with $30,000 USD through 2018 and 2019. This grant arrives very timely, in a period of transformation for our Community Network.
Continuously growing since 2010 to expand from Sarantaporo to even more villages in the region, today Sarantaporo.gr Community Network has reached a point where it is no longer possible to keep growing under the previous model, which was heavily dependent on the volunteering work of the nonprofit’s core team. Local inhabitants need to step in and Continue reading