Letter from the MTS-ISAC
For multiple reasons, 2020 was a year many of us will not soon forget. As we sat on New Year’s Eve in 2019 and looked toward 2020, we were filled with hope and ideas, some concrete and others more abstract, for accomplishments we wanted to achieve in the year ahead. Early in 2020 the world quickly realized we needed to improvise and innovate perhaps a little more than we thought at the end of 2019.
So, innovate and improvise we did! In the maritime sector, a small group of U.S. critical infrastructure stakeholders across the country from both the public and private sectors met in February 2020 to discuss a fundamental challenge to their cybersecurity efforts. They understood the importance of working together, sharing cyber threat information with each other to empower their individual risk management strategies while improving the collective resilience of the maritime sector.
While other forums existed, this group of key stakeholders clearly had a fundamental requirement for exchanging timely, actionable, and relevant cyber threat information was not being met. The outcome was the formation of the nonprofit Maritime Transportation System Information Sharing and Analysis Center (MTS-ISAC). The group formulated an agreed mission, which is to promote and facilitate maritime cybersecurity information sharing, awareness, training, and collaboration efforts between the private and public sector. The execution of this mission will effectively improve cyber risk management across the MTS community and serve as the information exchange center of excellence for the maritime community.
Given the severe impacts from COVID-19 on the maritime sector, we are incredibly grateful for the commitment of our Board of Directors and all our stakeholders. On both the public and private sector sides, their dedication and support in our first year of operation was nothing less than remarkable.
While there is more work in front of us than behind us, our first Annual Report highlights the incredible progress made to date, including key milestones and results achieved in our first year. We believe it is an amazing testament to the dedication and devotion to duty of everyone involved in supporting our mission.
From all of us at the MTS-ISAC, we appreciate your support! Thank you!!