Reports & Papers

20 Items

German Interior Minister Thomas de Maiziere talks to the media during his visit to the central department of fighting internet criminality (ZIT) in Giessen, Germany, Wednesday, Feb. 8, 2017. In background a map showing the amount of cyber attacks in a30 days.

AP Photo/Michael Probst

Paper - Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs, Harvard Kennedy School

Advancing Cyber Norms Unilaterally: How the U.S. Can Meet its Paris Call Commitments

| January 2023

Establishing norms for state behavior in cyberspace is critical to building a more stable, secure, and safe cyberspace. Norms are defined as “a collective expectation for the proper behavior of actors with a given identity,” and declare what behavior is considered appropriate and when lines have been crossed. Cyberspace is in dire need of such collective expectations. However, despite efforts by the international community and individual states to set boundaries and craft agreements, clear and established cyber norms for state behavior remain elusive. As early as 2005, the UN Group of Governmental Experts (GGE) and UN Open-Ended Working Group (OEWG) both aimed to create shared “rules of the road,” but fundamental disagreements between states and a lack of accountability and enforcement mechanisms have prevented these initiatives from substantively implementing cyber norms. As a result, the international community and individual states are left with no accountability mechanisms or safeguards to protect civilians and critical infrastructure from bad actors in cyberspace.

Report - Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs, Harvard Kennedy School

The Case for Increased Transatlantic Cooperation on Artificial Intelligence

    Authors:
  • Christie Lawrence
  • Sean Cordey
| August 2020

This report’s purpose is twofold: first, to inform policymakers and researchers about the current state of transatlantic AI efforts; and second, to recommend specific areas where transatlantic AI collaboration should be strengthened. Based on a comprehensive study of over 260 documents and reports covering the period from December 1997 to June 2020, we proposes more than 16 recommendations to increase US-EU AI collaboration across the entire AI ecosystem, as well as 9 recommendations for AI cooperation in the healthcare, environmental sciences, and defense sectors. Greater transatlantic efforts are needed to prevent the advancement of an AI vision that is adversarial and harmful to the wellbeing of the United States, the European Union, and allies.

In this April 22, 2020 photo, Gerard Bakulikira, right, and captain Tim Daghelet, left, both wear a Romware COVID Radius digital bracelet, which flashes red when people are too close to each other and creates a log of contacts. 

AP Photo/Virginia Mayo

Paper

Considerations for Digital Contact Tracing Tools for COVID-19 Mitigation: Recommendations for Stakeholders and Policymakers

Many are looking to digital contact tracing to assist reopening efforts, especially in light of reports that the U.S. could expect as many as 100,000 more deaths due to the virus by this Fall. This report focuses on how the U.S. might consider various proposed solutions.

We believe there are real benefits, challenges, and even potential harms in using digital solutions in the fight against COVID-19, but we must also acknowledge that the promise of any technology and associated systems to assist manual contact tracing efforts is largely hypothetical in the United States. There is not one catch-all answer; the truth is that technology is not a panacea, but it may be able to assist official efforts at an unprecedented time. However, no technological solution can succeed without two specific factors: public trust and buy-in, and rapid, widespread testing for everyone living in the U.S. To achieve the first, a number of factors must be addressed by officials in the states looking to implement digital solutions, and by technology developers.
 

PRC flag with digital overlay

Adobe Stock

Paper - Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs, Harvard Kennedy School

Governing Cyberspace: State Control vs. The Multistakeholder Model

| August 2019

This paper is part of a Track-II dialogue between the Belfer Center’s China Cyber Policy Initiative and the China Institute for International Strategic Studies (CIISS) to manage the risk of cyber conflict between the two countries through dialogue and concrete policy recommendations. The paper includes two parts: a cyber governance theory written by Chinese People’s Liberation Army Major General (ret.) Hao Yeli, a senior adviser to CIISS, and a response prepared by Belfer Center Co-Director Eric Rosenbach and Research Assistant Shu Min Chong.

Election Cyber Incident Communications Plan Template: International Edition

Adobe Stock

Report - Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs, Harvard Kennedy School

Election Cyber Incident Communications Plan Template: International Edition

May 2018

This Template is primarily intended for use by political parties or campaigns as a foundation from which they can develop their own tailored communications response plans, which include best practices, recommended external response processes, and scenarios to anticipate an election cyber incident.

Paper - Cyber Security Project, Belfer Center

A Legislator's Guide to Reauthorizing Section 702

    Author:
  • Anne Boustead
| Aug. 20, 2017

Section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) Amendments Act of 2008, a powerful surveillance tool that allows U.S. government agencies to spy on foreign persons to collect counter-terrorism intelligence, will expire on December 31, 2017 without Congressional reauthorization. This paper has two goals: to concisely describe how agencies obtain information under Section 702, and to provide guidance to legislators and their staffers by examining the core issues they will confront as they consider reauthorizing this legislation.