Cyber Guardian Exercise: A Case Study in Brazil to Address Challenges in Cybersecurity and Protect Critical Infrastructure

Discussions of cybersecurity, in particular those associated with critical infrastructure (CI), often seem alarmist, but crippling attacks against critical infrastructure have already taken place in Estonia and Ukraine demonstrate this concern and need to be addressed. Specialists use catastrophic scenarios in which cyberattacks can lead to massive blackouts and substantial economic losses as a way to draw attention to cybersecurity issues. Cyberattacks may generate kinetic and non-kinetic effects on CI of interest to National Defense, with the risk of causing strategic paralysis in the functioning of countries.

To address these challenges, Brazil needs to create the necessary conditions to establish important principles of cyber protection for national sectors and strategic infrastructure, aiming to form a solid cybersecurity community based on the exchange of experiences and a strong partnership. One of the approaches consists in carrying out the Brazil Cyber Guardian Exercise (CGE) that establishes cyber protection principles for important national and critical infrastructure sectors in Brazil.