Network Working Group A. Dulaunoy
Internet-Draft P. Bourmeau
Expires: December 11, 2020 CIRCL
June 9, 2020

Recommendations on naming threat actors

Abstract

This document provides advice on the naming of threat actors (also known as malicious actors). The objective is to provide practical advices for organisations such as security vendors or organisations attributing incidents to a group of threat actor. It also discusses the implication of naming a threat actor towards intelligence analysts and threat intelligence platforms such as MISP [MISP-P]].

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This Internet-Draft will expire on December 11, 2020.

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Table of Contents

1. Introduction

In threat intelligence, a name can be assigned to a threat actor without specific guidelines. This leads to issues such as a:

This document proposes a set of guidelines to name threat actors. The goal is to reduce the above mentioned issues.

1.1. Conventions and Terminology

The key words "MUST", "MUST NOT", "REQUIRED", "SHALL", "SHALL NOT", "SHOULD", "SHOULD NOT", "RECOMMENDED", "MAY", and "OPTIONAL" in this document are to be interpreted as described in RFC 2119 [RFC2119].

2. Recommendations

The recommendations listed below provide a minimal set of guidelines while assigning a new name to a threat actor.

2.1. Reusing threat actor naming

Before creating a new threat actor name, you MUST consider a review of existing threat actor names from databases such as the threat actor MISP galaxy [MISP-G]. Proliferation of threat actor names is a significant challenge for the day-to-day analyst work. If your threat actor defined an existing threat actor, you MUST reuse an existing threat actor name. If there is no specific threat actor name, you SHALL create a new threat actor following the best practices defined in this document.

2.2. Uniqueness

When choosing a threat actor name, uniqueness is a critical property. The threat actor name MUST be unique and not existing in different contexts. The name MUST not be a word from a dictionary which can be used in other contexts.

2.3. Format

The name of the threat actor SHALL be composed of a single word. If there is multiple part like a decimal value such as a counter, the values MUST be separated with a dash. Single words are preferred to ease the search of keywords by analysts in public sources.

2.4. Encoding

The name of the threat actor MUST be expressed in ASCII 7-bit. Assigning a localized name to a threat actor MAY create a set of ambiguity about different localized version of the same threat actor.

2.5. Don't confuse actor naming with malware naming

The name of the threat actor MUST NOT be assigned based on the tools, techniques or patterns used by the threat actor. A notorious example in the threat intelligence community is Turla which can name a threat actor but also a malware used by this group or other groups.

2.6. Directory

3. Examples

Some known examples are included below and serve as reference for good practices in naming threat actors. The below threat actor names can be considered good example:

The below threat actor names can be considered as example to not follow:

4. Security Considerations

Naming a threat actor could include specific sensitive reference to a case or an incident. Before releasing the naming, the creator MUST review the name to ensure no sensitive information is included in the threat actor name.

5. Acknowledgements

The authors wish to thank all contributors who provided feedback via Twitter.

6. References

7. References

7.1. Normative References

[MISP-G] Community, M., "MISP Galaxy - Public repository"
[RFC2119] Bradner, S., "Key words for use in RFCs to Indicate Requirement Levels", BCP 14, RFC 2119, DOI 10.17487/RFC2119, March 1997.

7.2. Informative References

[MISP-P] Community, M., "MISP Project - Open Source Threat Intelligence Platform and Open Standards For Threat Information Sharing"

Authors' Addresses

Alexandre Dulaunoy Computer Incident Response Center Luxembourg 16, bd d'Avranches Luxembourg, L-1160 Luxembourg Phone: +352 247 88444 EMail: alexandre.dulaunoy@circl.lu
Pauline Bourmeau Corexalys 26 Rue de la Bienfaisance Paris, 75008 France EMail: info@corexalys.com