The governance of cybersecurity

Abstract

Cybersecurity is a particularly complex field, where multiple public and private actors must work together, often across state borders, not only to address current weaknesses, but also to anticipate and prevent or pre-empt a number of different kinds of threats. This report examines how public policy and regulatory measures are used to organise such processes in five countries: Canada, Estonia, Germany, the Netherlands and the UK. For each country an analysis was made of cybersecurity governance in three areas: botnet mitigation, protection of vital infrastructures and protection of identity infrastructures. The cases were selected to be diverse, and to cover the main aspects of cybersecurity (confidentiality, availability and integrity), different domains of government (law enforcement, national security, and service delivery), and different levels of private-actor involvement. CONTENT: 1. Introduction 2. The concept of cybersecurity governance 3. Case 1: botnet migration 4. Case 2: protection of vital infrastructures 5. Case 3: protection of identity infrastructures 6. Discussion and conclusion