Summary
Reducing the Attack Surface for The Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA), the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), and the U.K.’s National Cyber Security Centre (NCSC) are releasing this fact sheet to urge defensive action against malicious cyber activity by nation-state threat actors. Nation-state threat actors exploit end-of-support (EOS) edge devices—including, but not limited to, load balancers, firewalls, routers, and virtual private network (VPN) gateways—to gain network access, maintain presence, and compromise sensitive data. Organizations using EOS devices are particularly vulnerable to compromise, especially if they are using EOS devices exposed to the public internet or external systems at the network’s “edge.” CISA’s Binding Operational Directive (BOD) 26-02: Mitigating Risk From End-of-Support Edge Devices requires U.S. Federal Civilian Branch (FCEB) agencies to manage the lifecycle of edge devices to defend against malicious cyber activity. Although the BOD 26-02 requirement only applies to FCEB agencies, CISA, FBI, and NCSC strongly encourage organizations to follow the guidance in the BOD and this fact sheet to safeguard systems, data, and operations from nation-state threat actors.