The Cyber Law Toolkit, a unique interactive online resource on international law and cyber operations, has released its annual update, including new scenarios, real-world cyber incidents and national positions. The Toolkit is now accepting submissions for new scenarios to be included in the 2025 general update.
The Toolkit serves as a self-learning and capacity-building tool for State representatives and legal professionals. It features more than 30 hypothetical scenarios, each describing cyber incidents inspired by real-world examples, along with detailed legal analysis. These entries explore the applicability of international law to each scenario and the legal issues they raise.
To ensure the Toolkit remains aligned with the latest developments in cybersecurity and continues to be a valuable resource for both practitioners and scholars, it is regularly updated. The project team is now inviting proposals for new scenarios for inclusion in the 2025 update. Each submission should describe a hypothetical cyber incident and discuss the international legal issues it presents. The submission deadline is 15 November 2024. Successful authors will receive an honorarium.
For more information on the submission process, please download the full details here: Cyber Law Toolkit: Call for Submissions for the 2025 Annual Update (PDF)
What was achieved in 2024 – Highlights of the 2024 Update
New scenarios
- Scenario 30 covers backdoors and implants, focusing on states establishing and countering backdoors in each other’s networks.
- Scenario 31 examines the sharing of degrading content during an armed conflict, specifically analyzing the legal implications of a widely circulated graphic video.
- Scenario 32 addresses the crime of aggression, exploring whether certain cyber operations (targeting an electric grid and military systems) may give rise to individual criminal responsibility.
Cyber incidents
The repository of real-world examples has grown to 72 incidents. Among the most recent additions from 2023 are:
- Cyber incident against a water authority in Pennsylvania
- Operations against NATO’s aid mission in Turkey and Syria
- Data breach at the International Criminal Court
These examples, as always, are linked to relevant scenarios that provide legal analysis.
National positions
The Toolkit continues to expand its database, now tracking 39 national positions and one common position from the African Union. Several states, including Austria, the Czech Republic, and Costa Rica, have explicitly acknowledged the Toolkit as a resource relied on in preparing their positions. Costa Rica also highlighted the Toolkit as a legal capacity-building initiative during its statement at the UN Security Council open debate on Addressing evolving threats in cyberspace in June 2024.