Going Viral: Bioeconomy Defense: Summary Report

In May 2023, Johns Hopkins Applied Physics Laboratory and the BIO-ISAC hosted a two-day tabletop exercise in May 2023 focusing on the intersection of the digital/cyber domain and the bioeconomy. Experts from public and private sectors across public health, policy, cyber, physical sciences, and law identified vulnerabilities, developed mitigation recommendations, and established a greater understanding of the extent of the threats that currently exist in key biological capabilities.

Today, the group releases the short form report highlighting the findings from this activity.

Download the Report

Accounting for nearly five to seven percent of the United States GDP, safeguarding the bioeconomy has become a national priority and an economic necessity. The COVID-19 response relied upon effective, timely, and trusted biological workflows, but these workflows are dependent upon systems and sources susceptible to digital compromise at the intersection of cyber and biology. These actions can threaten the United States’ economic competitiveness and national security, impede the deployment of medical responses, raise questions about the safety of the response actions, or significantly degrade processes necessary for response development. These vulnerabilities in our bioeconomy can be abused, as cyber adversaries and strategic competitors use legal and illegal means to acquire United States technologies and data, including biological data, and proprietary or pre-competitive information.

An in-depth report will be released in Fall 2023.