Digital security is the economic and social facet of cybersecurity. It concerns all stakeholders: businesses, public administrations, other organisations and individuals.  It covers how stakeholders protect their assets, safety, reputation, opportunities, and the continuity of their economic and social activities from the consequences of incidents disrupting the availability, integrity and confidentiality of hardware, software, networks and data.

The use of the word digital (as in digital economy and digital transformation) instead of cyber (as in cybercrime, cyberdefence, cyberwarfare and cyberespionage) emphasises the economic and social focus of the Global Forum.

Digital security policies include, for example:

• approaches to encourage good digital security risk management practice in organisations,
• reducing the digital security skills shortage,
• developing the digital security market,
• fostering digital security innovation,
• protecting critical infrastructures and essential services,
• developing more secure digital products and services,
• encouraging public-private partnerships to share risk-related information,
• better protecting SMEs and government services at all levels

"Digital security" does not cover digital issues directly related to law enforcement or national and international security, such as defense, arms controls, and confidence building measures.

Digital security for prosperity is part of a broader policy agenda to build sustainable trust in the digital economy and support the digital transformation of the economy and society.

With the digital transformation of economies and societies, digital security risk affects all economic sectors, stages of the value chain and social actors. With the Internet of Things (IoT) and artificial intelligence, our digital dependency keeps growing and the potential economic and social impact of digital security failures continues to increase.

Digital security risk is also cross-border in essence. Law enforcement and international security facets of cybersecurity are discussed in several international fora. However, international co-operation on economic and social aspects of cybersecurity is more limited. Yet most governments and stakeholders face similar challenges, although in different contexts, and have a common interest to better manage digital security risk for prosperity. They can greatly benefit from exchanging views, sharing good practice and shaping together an international agenda in this area. But they first need to engage in a dialogue on specific themes where progress can be made.

The objective of the OECD Global Forum on Digital Security for Prosperity is to fill the gap and offer an international multilateral setting where all stakeholders can discuss, learn from each other, and influence public policy making.

The overarching mission of the OECD is to promote policies that will improve the economic and social well-being of people around the world: “better policies for better lives”.

The Global Forum on Digital Security for Prosperity builds on OECD’s longstanding digital security expertise since the early 1990s. OECD work in this area is part includes many analytical reports and legal instruments, such as the Recommendation on Digital Security Risk Management for Economic and Social Prosperity (2015), the Recommendation on Digital Security of Critical Activities, work on digital identity, malware, national cybersecurity strategies, RFID technologies, and more. It is part of a broader OECD agenda on digital economy policy.

This hybrid event will take place on 10-11 July 2024 at the Swiss Grand Hotel in Seoul, Korea. Participation is by invitation only.

The Global Forum held its fourth event at OECD headquarters in Paris on 13-14 March. The  theme was AI and the Internet of Things.

The COVID-19 pandemic highlighted our global interdependences and accelerated our reliance on digital technologies.

In a world of increased uncertainty and complexity, agile co-operation based on shared values is essential to build cyber resilience. How can we work together to strengthen digital security both in normal and crisis times? This was the overarching question throughout the third Global Forum event, hosted by Israel and held virtually on 7-9 June 2021.

Digital security innovation is an increasingly important priority for policy makers who need to i) encourage the development of an ecosystem enabling digital security startups to proliferate, get the investment and support they need to win business, scale up and provide a pipeline of innovation; and ii) encourage all startups to take digital security into account from the outset as they develop increasingly digital-intensive and digital-dependent products and services.

The second annual event of the OECD Global Forum on Digital Security for Prosperity focused on how to encourage and facilitate best practice for supporting innovation in digital security, and “security by design” in broader digital innovation.

This first event examined the roles and responsibilities of actors for digital security, with a focus on good practice for the governance of digital security risk in organisations, and improving digital security of technologies throughout their life cycle.

It brought together businesses and organisations using digital technologies, suppliers of these technologies, suppliers of security solutions, experts from civil society and academia as well as government policy makers interested in encouraging the adoption of best practice to reduce digital security risk.