The White House has begun its second annual International Counter Ransomware Summit, where Biden administration officials will meet with representatives of the countries and companies involved to discuss the growing threat of data-destroying cyberattacks.
The International Counter Ransomware Summit will be attended by 36 countries and technology companies, including Microsoft Corp., Siemens AG and Mandiant, a division of Google LLC. Participants at the summit include Mexico, the Republic of Korea, several African nations, Ukraine, the United Kingdom, Japan, Israel and others. Crowdstrike, Mandiant, Microsoft and other technology companies with security concerns as well as FBI Director Christopher Wray, national security advisor Jake Sullivan and other department heads will be present.
The U.S. government says it is concerned that ransomware attacks exceed the government’s ability to stop them, which it cited as another reason for holding the second summit.
To address these cybersecurity challenges, the action-oriented agenda focuses on five themes: increasing the resilience of all partners, discouraging cyber criminals, combating illicit financing, building partnerships in the private sector, and strengthening global cooperation.
The Resilience Working Group, set up at the first summit last year, is said to have held two threat exercises in 2021 to ensure members could participate and learn from each other to implement best practice in case of an attack.
The sources for this piece include an article in TheRegister.
