Global security and prosperity depend on a secure and stable cyberspace. A myriad of factors threaten equilibrium including: cyberspace's continued militarization, growing activism by non-state actors, sector-based risks that require specialized knowledge and persistent asymmetries in capability. These considerations create the need for an international forum that seeks to deepen consensus on the topic of cyber norms.
The Global Commission on the Stability of Cyberspace (GCSC) was formally launched at the Munich Security Conference in February 2017 with the support of the Government of the Netherlands. The GCSC serves as a multistakeholder body to generate, evaluate and recommend various state and non-state norms of behavior in cyberspace and propose policy initiatives for inclusion in wider dialogue.
Accomplishments:
In December 2015, EWI advocated for the establishment of a forum to help deepen consensus around emerging cyber norms and bridging remaining substantial divides on normative issues. EWI, in cooperation with The Hague Centre for Strategic Studies, co-directs the secretariat of the Global Commission on the Stability of Cyberspace.
The Commission was officially launched in 2017 by the Dutch Minister of Foreign Affairs Bert Koenders and met four times throughout the year, culminating in the issuance of its first norm, “Call to Protect the Public Core of the Internet,” at its meeting in November 2017 in New Delhi. This norm urges all stakeholders to avoid any activity that would “intentionally and substantially damage the general availability or integrity” of the infrastructure (such as Internet routing, the domain name system, certificates and trust, and communications cables) that the world depends on to make the Internet work every day.
Building on its successful first year, in 2018 the Commission produced a definition of the public core of the Internet to clarify its first norm, a new norm on protecting electoral infrastructure, and a package of norms addressing topics such as tampering, botnets and offensive cyber operations.
In November 2019, the Global Commission on the Stability of Cyberspace completed its original mandate by issuing its final report, Advancing Cyberstability, which represents the culmination of the Commission’s work over the last three years, offering a framework to advance cyberstability, a set of four principles, six recommendations, and eight norms that address critical elements of implementation, monitoring, and accountability.
Goals:
EWI supports the Global Commission on the Stability of Cyberspace to facilitate new norms, policies and initiatives that support the security and stability of cyberspace through research, information exchanges, capacity building and advocating proposals for action.
EWI PUBLICATIONS:
Promoting International Cyber Norms: A New Advocacy Forum
A Measure of Restraint in Cyberspace: Reducing Risk to Civilian Nuclear Assets
RELATED PUBLICATIONS:
Global Commission on the Stability of Cyberspace: Final Report
Global Commission on the Stability of Cyberspace: Norm Package
Global Commission on the Stability of Cyberspace: Call to Protect the Electoral Infrastructure
Global Commission on the Stability of Cyberspace: Call to Protect the Public Core of the Internet
The need for a Digital Geneva Convention