La brecha de ciberseguridad en América Latina frente al contexto global de ciberamenazas

Abstract

This research is based on the hypothesis that the governments of Latin America and the Caribbean are lagging behind in the construction of cyber defense capabilities to face the international context of cyber threats, with respect to the member countries of North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO), both in the organizational plan, as in the individual. To prove this statement, the text is divided into six sections. The first part presents the global environment of cyber threats, the economic losses suffered by governments and companies according to reports from information security firms such as Kaspersky, Microsoft, Verizon and International Business Machines Corporation (IBM). The second part presents the internet securitization process, the immersion of cybersecurity in national security studies, and the definition of cyber capabilities and the delimitation of threats to the Nation-State from cyberspace are addressed. The third part shows the trajectory of NATO as an organization in the development of cyber capabilities in the last twenty years. In the fourth part, a set of National Cybersecurity Strategies (ENCS) of NATO countries and allies is analyzed from the individual level, from which their main elements are extracted and their general anatomy is outlined. In the sixth part, an approach to different regional or global cybersecurity environments is presented based on measurements of the Global Cybersecurity Index (GCI), of the International Telecommunications Union (ITU), and the National Cyber Security Index (NSCI) of the Estonian E-Governance Academy. The fifth section presents the context of cybersecurity in Latin America and the Caribbean, according to studies made by the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB) and the Organization of American States (OAS), as well as private cybersecurity firms. In the sixth, two case studies of Mexico, from the 2019-2020, are briefly presented, which represent the lack of maturity of its ENCS and development of cyber capabilities, an aspect that it shares with most of the countries of Latin America and Caribbean. Finally, brief conclusions are presented on the aspects to be strengthened by the region.