White House Road Map Provides Guidance on BGP Internet Routing Security

Last week, the White House Office of the National Cyber Director (ONCD) unveiled a Road Map to Enhancing Internet Routing Security to provide guidance on how to address a security vulnerability related to the Border Gateway Protocol (BGP), which is a key part of how data flows across the internet.

BGP consists of rules on the best routes for information to be transmitted on the internet across private, public, corporate, and government networks. BGP operates using peers, which perform route discovery, route storage, and path selection. Entities that use BGP include cloud providers, internet service providers, universities, energy companies, and large enterprises.

When internet traffic gets improperly diverted, either intentionally or inadvertently, that could lead to theft, extortion, state-level espionage, and failure of critical infrastructure, the ONCD said.

“Securing BGP is essential to safeguarding the integrity of our digital infrastructure,” Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency Director Jen Easterly said in a statement. “Through strong partnerships—both with industry and with government agencies—we can enhance the resilience of our internet routing, ensuring a secure and reliable internet for our nation.”

BGP predates the public internet, explains Will Townsend, vice president and principal analyst at Moor Insights & Strategy.

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