Shostack + Friends Blog Archive

 

Why Don't We Have an Incident Repository?

Steve Bellovin and I provided some “Input to the Commission on Enhancing National Cybersecurity.” It opens:

We are writing after 25 years of calls for a “NTSB for Security” have failed to result in action. As early as 1991, a National Research Council report called for “build[ing] a repository of incident data” and said “one possible model for data collection is the incident reporting system administered by the National Transportation Safety Board.” [1] The calls for more data about incidents have continued, including by us [2, 3].

The lack of a repository of incident data impacts our ability to answer or assess many of your questions, and our key recommendation is that the failure to establish such a repository is, in and of itself, worthy of study. There are many factors in the realm of folklore as to why we do not have a repository, but no rigorous answer. Thus, our answer to your question 4 (“What can or should be done now or within the next 1-2 years to better address the challenges?”) is to study what factors have inhibited the creation of a repository of incident data, and our answer to question 5 (“what should be done over a decade?”) is to establish one. Commercial air travel is so incredibly safe today precisely because of decades of accident investigations, investigations that have helped plane manufacturers, airlines, and pilots learn from previous failures.