Recently, Trend Micro and INTERPOL announced that Trend Micro will help train law enforcement personnel from participating countries all over the world to help them cope with today’s cybercrime threats. We are honored to help INTERPOL in its fight against cybercrime; this is completely in line with our vision of creating “A World Safe for Exchanging Digital Information.”
The details of our collaboration are in our press releases, but I want to use this topic to discuss, more broadly, how and why Trend Micro works with law enforcement agencies around the world to stop cybercrime.
Why is it so important that law enforcement and security companies like Trend Micro work closely together to deal with today’s threats? The answer is: each group brings very different skillsets – and mindsets – to the table. By working together, they are able to work best to become effective against cybercrime.
Security researchers have a wide variety of information at their disposal. They have threat information from their company’s operations, as well as underground information – frequently from the “social networks” they form while visiting underground forums undercover.
In addition, researchers typically work as teams which are multinational, have a wide reach of knowledge and specialties available to them, and used to making decisions quickly. All these traits are quite helpful in keeping up with cybercriminals.
However, security researchers can only go so far. Law enforcement has access to powers that are needed to truly identify those responsible for attacks. Servers can be seized, communications (electronic or otherwise) can be monitored, as provided for by courts. This in-depth information allows for the identification of the actual persons behind online crimes, who can then be arrested and brought to trial.
In the absence of cooperation, a wide variety of problems can occur. Researchers may release information into the public, which may interfere with in-progress investigations by police. The released information may not even result in anything of significance, as the researchers cannot enforce laws. Meanwhile, law enforcement can’t deal with cybercrime: it moves fast, it’s not clear “where” it actually takes place, and depending on local laws it may not be “crime” in the first place.
While it is essential for law enforcement to partner with security companies to catch cybercriminals, they also need to be careful in choosing their partners. Some companies are perceived (rightly or wrongly) to be close to certain governments. The partners also need to be discreet in releasing information to the public; prematurely released information can seriously damage long-running investigations and cause promising leads to go cold. Picking the wrong partner can also hurt, not help, the fight against cybercrime.
As a company, we work very hard to ensure that we have good relationships with law enforcement agencies from all over the world. We meet at conferences, internal meetings, and other events on a regular basis that serve as a way for us to exchange information. An example of the fruits of our cooperation was the recent arrest of a key figure in ransomware gangs. By working closely with Spanish law enforcement, Trend Micro was able to gather actionable information that led to arrests in this case.
We strongly believe that by working with law enforcement, we are able to go after cybercriminals directly. Instead of targeting their hosting infrastructure – both infected machines and malicious servers can be replaced easily enough – we go after the true suspects, the persons responsible for various attacks. Going after these perpetrators, we believe, is the best way to ensure a safer Internet for everyone.
