A brief history of DISARM

Beginnings and usage

  • A key moment in the genesis of the DISARM Framework was a meeting of like-minded individuals at a hybrid warfare workshop in the summer of 2018
  • In 2019, with the support of Craig Newmark Philanthropies, the group created AMITT (Adversarial Misinformation Influence Tactics & Techniques) under the MisinfoSec Standards Working Group and the Credibility Coalition
  • In January 2020, the Cogsec Collaborative was formed, building and connecting response groups and tools for free, and in fast/agile ways under AMITT/DISARM methods
  • The AMITT framework immediately began helping support a wide variety of organizations.  It has since been used in practice across the UN, WHO, EU, NATO and various country teams.

Collaborating with MITRE and others

  • The team was in close contact with The MITRE Corporation, as AMITT was built with synergy to MITRE’s signature ATT&CK information security framework, using STIX and MISP in common
  • MITRE did not take on the role of managing AMITT as an open resource, but did in parallel create SP!CE, drawing in the AMITT framework as a base
  • SP!CE and AMITT have now been merged to create a single master, open source DISARM Framework.  SP!CE continues as a MITRE-owned fork, related to DISARM, providing additional computation and scoring functionality
  • MITRE’s work on SP!CE was delivered in partnership with Florida International University and then students Savina Koda and Daniel Sixto, responsible for the detailed work and the current efforts to merge SP!CE with AMITT/DISARM
  • The DISARM Foundation is looking at the possibility of merging with other frameworks that have their roots in AMITT, so that the wider community can easily identify and share a single master framework, that everyone can help enhance, promote and support together.

DISARM Foundation

  • The DISARM Foundation was created in late 2021 after changing the name of the framework from AMITT to DISARM — Disinformation Analysis & Risk Management Framework
  • This entity is focused solely on the framework, to ensure it is protected as an open source resource and enhanced, promoted and supported by and for the user community
  • SJ Terp and Pablo Breuer, who led the initial 2019 creation remain the joint design authority
  • The DISARM Foundation has been established with the kind support of Public Democracy America and Alliance4Europe‍
  • This year, in 2022, the development, testing, and deployment of DISARM has been greatly supported by the Alfred Landecker Foundation via Alliance4Europe
  • We're continuing our work to ensure robust governance for the framework, to carry it forward safely into the future, adapting to meet the evolving needs.