At the second Counter Ransomware Initiative, or CRI, Summit, the members – Australia, Austria, Belgium, Brazil, Bulgaria, Canada, Croatia, Czech Republic, Dominican Republic, Estonia, France, Germany, India, Ireland, Israel, Italy, Japan, Kenya, Lithuania, Mexico, the Netherlands, New Zealand, Nigeria, Norway, Poland, Republic of Korea, Romania, Singapore, South Africa, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, United Arab Emirates, United Kingdom, United States, Ukraine and, the newly-joining, Belgium – reaffirmed their joint commitments to counter all elements of ransomware threats and discussed the next steps. They commit to continue building collective resilience to ransomware, cooperating to disrupt ransomware and pursue the responsible actors, countering illicit finance that underpins the ransomware ecosystem, as well as working with the private sector to defend against ransomware attacks.
To achieve the aforementioned goals, the members commit to continuous action, namely, they intend to:
- Hold ransomware actors accountable for their crimes and not provide them safe haven
- Combat ransomware actors’ ability to profit from illicit proceeds by implementing and enforcing anti-money laundering and countering the financing of terrorism (AML/CFT) measures, including “know your customer” (KYC) rules, for virtual assets and virtual asset service providers
- Disrupt and bring to justice ransomware actors and their enablers, to the fullest extent permitted under each partner’s applicable laws and relevant authorities
- Collaborate in disrupting ransomware by sharing information, where appropriate and in line with applicable laws and regulations, about the misuse of infrastructure to launch ransomware attacks to ensure national cyber infrastructure is not being used in ransomware attacks
More so, the members took stock of the developments in the five working groups that have been established under the initiative, namely the working groups on: Resilience, Diplomacy, Disruption, Countering Illicit Financing, and Public-Private Partnership.
Ransomware is a high EU priority and the EU is committed to combating ransomware in different areas (resilience, diplomacy, disruption, illicit financing). Strengthening resilience and combating ransomware attacks requires cooperation across borders to develop tools, share information, improve awareness and prevent cyber-attacks. Find out more about the EU’s activities to combat ransomware.
Read more about the event and its outcomes in the joint statement published following the Summit.