NEW YORK: Facebook has launched a test platform for companies to share threat data about cyber attacks and improve communication among security teams,
The new site, called ThreatExchange, is based on Facebook’s internal software to catalog and understand threats, known as Threat Data.
“ThreatExchange is a platform created by Facebook that enables security professionals anywhere to share threat information more easily, learn from each other’s discoveries, and make their own systems safer,” the company said.
Facebook said the platform also has privacy controls “so that participants can help protect any sensitive data by specifying who can see the threat information they contribute.”
The privacy concern is one reason that companies have been reluctant to work together in the past and share information about their vulnerabilities.
Facebook said it was trying to encourage collaboration through Threat Exchange, citing an example from a year ago when the company’s services were attacked by a botnet. The company teamed with other technology companies to get a clearer picture about the nature of the attack.
“We quickly learned that sharing with one another was key to beating the botnet because parts of it were hosted on our respective services and none of us had the complete picture,” Mark Hammell, Facebook’s manager of threat infrastructure, wrote in a blog post.
“During our discussions, it became clear that what we needed was a better model for threat sharing,” he wrote.
Early adopters of the system included Twitter, Bitly, Dropbox, Tumblr and Yahoo.
