The US National Security Agency (NSA) and CISA has published a new guidance document which focuses on addressing some identified threats to 5G network slicing, and provides industry recognized practices for the design, deployment, operation, and maintenance of a hardened 5G standalone network slice.
‘5G Network Slicing: Security Considerations for Design, Deployment, and Maintenance’ has been developed by the Enduring Security Framework (ESF), a public-private cross-sector working group led by the NSA and CISA. It builds upon the 2022 ESF guidance Potential Threats to 5G Network Slicing.
What is 5G network slicing?
The guidance defines a network slice as an end-to-end logical network that provides specific network capabilities and characteristics for a user. It is a network architecture that allows infrastructure providers to divide their network up into several virtual networks to satisfy different 5G use cases with varying quality of service requirements.
The document aims to help foster communication amongst mobile network operators, hardware manufacturers, software developers, non-mobile network operators, systems integrators, and network slice customers “in the hopes that it may facilitate increased resiliency and security hardening within network slicing”.
Read the document (PDF).
