The Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, within their Technology and International Affairs Program, has released a new report, “Exploring Law Enforcement Hacking as a Tool Against Transnational Cyber Crime.”
According to the report, new ransomware records were broken in 2023 “with over a billion dollars in payments going to hackers.” A significant challenge in combating such cyber crime lies in the likelihood that perpetrators’ operations are occurring in jurisdictions where legal recourse, including extradition, is limited. Consequently, policymakers are often reliant on intelligence services and the military to intercept these threats. To increase cybersecurity effectiveness, Western law enforcement agencies (LEAs) have begun enhancing their capabilities “to cross both technical and national boundaries to take on cyber criminals.”
For their research, the authors interviewed current and former officials, industry insiders, and legal experts from LEAs and asked the following questions:
– “Are LEA-led technical takedowns (such as ‘hacking the hackers’ or ‘hacking to patch’) an effective way to counter cyber crime?”
– “Does it really matter who conducts them?”
– “What role can the private sector play?”
For the detailed answers presented to these questions, we recommend exploring the report.
For more information on this topic, check out HSDL’s Focus collections on Cyber Policy, Cyber Infrastructure Protection, and Cyber Crime and National Security.
