AMPARO Project

Background

The Internet became a crucial tool for companies and individuals. All sorts of social and economic transactions are migrating to the global network becoming increasingly trivial and almost automatic. Unfortunately the increasing virtualization of the economy and society also brings significant challenges. Spam, improper access to confidential data and cyber theft are used by criminals and terrorists to cause great damage to organizations and institutions, particularly those in countries without the institutional capacity to protect themselves.

For these reasons, it is very important for organizations, governments and also for Internet access providers to have mechanisms to avoid and contain abusive activities that allow the generation of the problems mentioned above.

To counter these problems, one of the mechanisms that is being used more and more frequently is to have a team of individuals capable of responding to Internet security incidents at their corresponding level (company, service, country). These teams are usually known as Computer Security Incident Response Teams (CSIRT).

This projects aims to strengthen regional capacity for prevention and response to cyber security incidents in Latin America and the Caribbean. The project establishes a research agenda to identify and propose strategies to respond to the key threats to security in Latin America and the Caribbean. It promotes the development of a network of Computer Security Incident Response Teams (CSIRTs) in different countries of the region, building capacity in vulnerable institutions, particularly in less developed regions of the continent. The project will also contribute to create a regional platform to train computer security experts from the region and, finally, it will propose a study on the faisability of a regional CSIRT.

Project Objectives

The specific objectives are the following:

1. To develop applied research activities to contribute in solving the main aspects of the security threats in Latin America and the Caribbean
2. To promote the creation of CSIRTs in public and private entities at major-organization level and national level within the different countries of the region.
3. To promote the creation of a regional training platform of Computer Security experts.
4. To contribute to the creation of a regional CSIRT

Expected results

At the end of this project, the expected results will be the following:

• A regional agenda of research priorities in Security issues available.
• Materials available for training experts on CSIRT Creation and Operation
• Regional workshops conducted
• Regional workshop for Instructors conducted
• Course available on CSIRT Creation and Operation
• Experts trained in CSIRT Creation and Operation
• Experts trained in tools and methodologies for CSIRT operation
• Regional instructors trained in CSIRT Creation and Operation
• The creation of a reference professional network to exchange information on CSIRT best practices and updates
• Research projects on Security issues executed
• Document containing best practice identification and systematization published
• Study on possible models, financial requirements, and impacts of the creation of a Regional CSIRT (LAC.CSIRT)