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NATO’s Locked Shields exercise took place in Tallinn last week, and it boasted a record turnout of countries.
The 2023 exercise saw 38 countries compete, with a total of 3,000 participants. The 2022 event saw only two-thirds of the number of people and only 32 countries participating.
There were only 22 teams and less than 1,000 participants.
The increased number of boots on the virtual ground is no doubt a result of the ongoing war in Ukraine and the overflow of cyber incidents from pro-Russian hacking groups targeting NATO countries supporting Ukraine. Countries in the region need to be better prepared to respond to cyber campaigns than ever before.
Locked Shields has been hosted by NATO’s Cooperative Cyber Defence Centre of Excellence (CCDCOE) in Estonia since 2010, and it involves exercises between an attacking red team, and a blue team made up of participating countries. Each blue team has to support a fictional country undergoing large-scale cyber attacks — protecting information systems and critical infrastructure from “thousands of attacks” from their red team adversaries.
The exercise is designed to test participating countries’ incident response plans, legal and media responses, and forensic skills.
“This past year has shown us how important strength in cyber defence is,” said Estonia’s Minister of Defence Hanno Pevkur. “Cyber warfare may not be as visible as kinetic warfare, but it is integrated into wartime activities. Ukraine has strong digital competences, and that has meant that their state can keep delivering essential digital services even in wartime.”
“Cyber competence grows through investments, but not only monetary ones — exercises like these, where allies with shared values also exchange know-how and train together, are key to continued resilience.”
Mart Noorma, director of NATO’s CCDCOE, believes that Locked Shields is a great way to build up cyber readiness and resilience, as well as build the skills to help countries coordinate their responses.
“Locked Shields thus focuses not only on cyber defence but also on strategy games, legal issues, and crisis communication,” Noorma said in an announcement.
“In the event of a major cyber attack, swift cooperation is crucial to prevent the escalation of a security crisis.”
David Hollingworth has been writing about technology for over 20 years, and has worked for a range of print and online titles in his career. He is enjoying getting to grips with cyber security, especially when it lets him talk about Lego.
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