Today, the information society has become an integral part of modern societies, propelling the end user to the forefront of communication.  Concurrently, sophisticated cyber threats persist and are constantly evolving. The vulnerabilities of ICTs have inevitably become a lure to cyber espionage, terrorism and warfare, posing serious threats to critical information infrastructure and to vulnerable groups such as children. The global and borderless nature of these threats and vulnerabilities require an international response and can only be adequately addressed through international cooperation.

At the World Summit on the Information Society (WSIS), world leaders entrusted ITU to take the lead in coordinating international efforts in building confidence and security in the use of ICTs, as the sole Facilitator of Action Line C5, “Building confidence and security in the use of ICTs”.  For this reason, on 17 May 2007, ITU Secretary-General launched the Global Cybersecurity Agenda (GCA) to provide a framework within which an international response to the growing threats and challenges can be coordinated and addressed. The GCA strives to engage all relevant stakeholders in a concerted effort to build confidence and security in the information society. To provide concrete activities towards curbing cyber threats at the global level, ITU and IMPACT entered into a formal collaboration dedicated to enhancing the global community’s capacity to prevent, defend and respond to cyber threats.