In The News
Happy Birthday GCA!
By Aimée Larsen Kirkpatrick
Three years ago, the Global Cyber Alliance was formed to reduce cyber risk across the Internet. Not your typical dues-collecting association, we set out to be different: to take action with efforts that are globally scalable and can make a measurable impact in the fight against cybercrime.
Founded by the Manhattan District Attorney’s Office, the City of London Police and the Center for Internet Security, GCA set out to provide freely available tools and resources that reduce cyber risk and protect governments, businesses and consumers across the globe. Our mantra: Do Something. Measure It. Every project we take on is geared towards action that must be measurable in its outcome.
Now, three years later, the Global Cyber Alliance has helped more than five thousand organizations deploy the DMARC (Domain-based Message Authentication, Reporting & Compliance) email protocol to protect their emails from spoofing. We have influenced governments, and trade and industry associations to also take action on DMARC. The GCA DMARC Setup Guide has been translated into 18 languages and has been used by almost 10,000 organizations in the past six months.
GCA was also the brainchild and driving force behind the development of Quad9, a collaboration that included PCH, IBM and a bevy of threat intelligence providers to build a global DNS service that provides users with security while maintaining their privacy. Consumers across the globe have been protected from accessing nearly 400 million malicious websites with the free service since its launch in November of 2017.
In 2016, the U.K government mandated that all U.K. government domains use DMARC. Influenced by this action and GCA’s efforts, the U.S. Department of Homeland Security required every federal civilian agency to deploy DMARC by October 16th of this year. GCA built a partnership of more than 230 organizations from around the world. Further, GCA signed a memorandum of understanding for cooperation on areas of mutual interest with Europol and a joint declaration with the International Telecommunication Union to cooperate for a safer and more secure Internet.
We are proud of our achievements over the past three years but realize there is much more work to be done. We thank the governments, nonprofits, corporations and cybersecurity experts across the globe who have helped us deliver our DMARC and DNS solutions. Over the next several years, there is much more to tackle, including a more secure infrastructure for the deployment of Internet of Things devices, the continued deployment of DMARC and DNS security solutions to governments, corporations and citizens worldwide, and the development of more solutions that will reduce cyber risk and, someday, eradicate those risks.
The Internet has become the central hub for every citizen, business, government and activity conducted across the globe. But, at its core, a secure foundation is the prerequisite for the Internet to reach its full potential.
We look forward to continuing our mission and invite you to participate with us.
The author, Aimée Larsen Kirkpatrick, is the Global Communications Officer at the Global Cyber Alliance. You can connect with her on LinkedIn.
