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A New Era in the Fight Against Transnational Cybercrime
The United States has taken a dramatic step toward reshaping how the government fights ransomware groups, online fraud networks, and other foreign cyber-enabled criminal organizations. A presidential memorandum signed by President Donald Trump on August 12, 2026, creates a federal program under which vetted U.S. cybersecurity companies can conduct certain offensive cyber operations against foreign cyber-enabled transnational criminal organizations — but only under government authority, direction, and oversight.
From Defensive Cybersecurity to Government-Directed Operations
For years, private cybersecurity companies have largely operated on the defensive side of the battlefield. They investigate breaches, identify malware, track criminal infrastructure, recover compromised systems, share threat intelligence, and help organizations contain attacks. The new memorandum moves the relationship between government and industry into considerably more aggressive territory.
Under the new program, approved companies may conduct both Cyber Surveillance Operations and Cyber Effects Operations against qualifying foreign cyber-enabled criminal organizations. The memorandum defines surveillance operations as unauthorized access intended primarily to collect information or intelligence, while Cyber Effects Operations can include manipulating, disrupting, denying, degrading, or destroying information systems, networks, infrastructure, or data.
This Is Not a License for Private Hack Back
One of the most important distinctions is that the memorandum does not simply legalize independent private-sector hacking. Participating companies cannot decide on their own to attack a ransomware gang or retaliate against a criminal server.
The White House document explicitly places participating companies under federal government control and supervision. Every operation must go through the newly established program, and the relevant government officials must provide written approval and direction before the operation begins.
The National Coordination Center Becomes the Operational Hub
The program will be created and managed through the National Coordination Center, or NCC. The NCC is tasked with coordinating the initiative and ensuring that participating companies operate within federal legal authorities and the procedures established for the program.
Two executive directors — one designated by the Attorney General and another designated by the Secretary of Homeland Security — will oversee the program. Their coordination is required before cyber operations can be approved.
Private Companies Will Become an Extension of Government Capability
The strategic logic behind the policy is straightforward: private cybersecurity companies frequently possess visibility into criminal infrastructure that government agencies may not have.
Security firms can monitor ransomware ecosystems, cryptocurrency-related criminal activity, phishing infrastructure, malware campaigns, compromised servers, underground marketplaces, botnets, and other hostile infrastructure across the world. The memorandum attempts to transform some of that private-sector visibility into an operational capability available to the U.S. government.
The White House describes private-sector innovation, scale, speed, and technical capacity as an underused advantage in the fight against transnational cybercrime.
Both Cybersecurity Giants and Smaller Specialists Can Participate
The initiative is not restricted to the largest American security companies. The implementation guidance must allow both large organizations and smaller specialized firms to participate.
That distinction could become significant. Large companies may provide substantial infrastructure, intelligence coverage, personnel, and global visibility, while smaller firms may possess highly specialized expertise in areas such as malware analysis, threat intelligence, industrial control systems, cryptocurrency tracing, vulnerability research, or adversary infrastructure tracking.
Rigorous Vetting Will Be Required
Companies will not automatically qualify simply because they are cybersecurity businesses. The memorandum requires rigorous vetting covering technical proficiency, demonstrated cyber-operation capabilities, facility security, personnel reliability, competence, and other relevant factors.
Participating companies must also operate under contractual agreements with the Department of Justice or Department of Homeland Security.
A $1 Million Compliance Mechanism Raises the Stakes
The implementation rules may require participating companies to maintain a bond or escrow worth at least $1 million.
That money can be forfeited if a participating company violates its contractual obligations. The requirement creates an unusually direct financial consequence for operational non-compliance and could help reinforce the government’s control over contractors participating in sensitive cyber operations.
Threat Intelligence Could Flow Directly Into Government-Approved Operations
Another important component concerns intelligence sharing. Participating companies may enter commercial agreements with private-sector organizations and receive threat information gathered through those organizations’ normal business activities.
Federal, state, local, tribal, and territorial agencies may also identify cyber-enabled transnational criminal threats to participating companies, allowing those companies to propose potential operations to the NCC.
The Definition of a Cyber Effects Operation Is Broad
The
It covers activities capable of manipulating, disrupting, denying, degrading, or destroying information systems, networks, infrastructure controlled by information systems, or information stored on those systems. In other words, the program potentially covers a broad range of offensive cyber capabilities.
Cyber Surveillance Can Involve Covert Access
The surveillance component is equally significant. The memorandum defines a Cyber Surveillance Operation as accessing information systems without authorization, or exceeding authorized access, primarily to obtain information or intelligence while intending to remain undetected.
This could allow government-directed specialists to gather intelligence from foreign criminal infrastructure before, during, or in preparation for other operations.
Criminal Infrastructure Could Face Disruption
The practical objective is ultimately disruption.
A ransomware organization may depend on command-and-control servers, data-leak infrastructure, authentication systems, hosting providers, cryptocurrency services, administrative panels, backup systems, communication platforms, or other digital infrastructure.
A government-authorized operation could potentially seek to interfere with selected infrastructure rather than merely observe it. The memorandum therefore represents a move toward actively reducing the operational capacity of criminal networks.
Critical Outcomes Are Specifically Restricted
The policy also establishes a major boundary. An operation cannot be approved through the standard program process if it is likely to result in loss of life or serious injury, or if it would rise to the level of a use of force or armed attack under international law.
Those restrictions are particularly important because offensive cyber operations can have consequences beyond the intended target.
U.S. Persons and Domestic Systems Receive Additional Safeguards
The memorandum also addresses the possibility of accidental or unintended targeting.
If a participating company discovers that an operation has exceeded its authorized parameters — including unintentionally targeting a U.S. person, a computer system located in the United States, or a system controlled by a U.S. person — it must stop the operation, conduct minimization procedures, and immediately notify the NCC.
Judicial Authorization May Still Be Required
The program is not intended to bypass every existing legal safeguard. The memorandum requires procedures ensuring that activity involving U.S. persons or otherwise implicating constitutional, federal, or international-law obligations receives any necessary authorization, including judicial authorization where required, before an operation can proceed.
The Government Must Approve Every Operation
Perhaps the strongest limitation is procedural.
The
A 60-Day Deadline Sets the Program in Motion
The memorandum gives the
Those procedures must define eligibility standards, operational workflows, target-identification processes, reporting requirements, deconfliction procedures, legal safeguards, and other controls.
The program is therefore authorized now, but its detailed operational machinery still has to be built.
Annual Reviews Will Determine Continued Participation
Participating companies will not receive a permanent blank check.
The operating procedures must include at least annual evaluations of participating companies. The government will therefore have an ongoing mechanism to assess whether a company remains suitable for the program.
The Policy Fits Into a Broader Cybercrime Offensive
The memorandum does not appear in isolation. It explicitly builds on Executive Order 14390, issued on March 6, 2026, concerning cybercrime, fraud, and predatory schemes against Americans.
The new policy expands that broader campaign by adding private-sector capabilities to the government’s operational toolkit.
Why Ransomware Groups Should Pay Attention
For ransomware operators, the most important change may be the possibility that organizations they traditionally viewed as defensive cybersecurity firms could become participants in government-directed operations.
A criminal group could increasingly face a security company that is not merely identifying its infrastructure, but potentially helping government investigators map it, penetrate it, collect intelligence from it, and disrupt selected components under official authorization.
That could make operational security significantly more difficult for sophisticated ransomware groups.
The Intelligence Advantage Could Be More Important Than Destruction
Although the phrase “offensive cyber operations” naturally attracts attention, intelligence collection could prove even more strategically valuable.
A government-directed surveillance operation could potentially reveal how a criminal organization communicates, which infrastructure it controls, how affiliates interact, where stolen information is stored, how victims are selected, and how money moves through the ecosystem.
That intelligence could support arrests, sanctions, infrastructure seizures, financial investigations, and future cyber operations.
Criminal Ecosystems Are Harder to Destroy Than Individual Servers
Modern cybercrime rarely depends on a single server.
Ransomware groups increasingly operate through distributed ecosystems involving affiliates, initial-access brokers, bulletproof hosting providers, cryptocurrency infrastructure, stolen credentials, proxy networks, cloud services, and disposable domains.
Disrupting one component may produce only temporary damage. The greater challenge is identifying the relationships connecting those components.
The Private Sector May Have the Visibility Governments Need
This is where cybersecurity companies could provide a significant advantage.
Security firms often see attacks across thousands of customers simultaneously. They may observe infrastructure patterns before investigators have access to a complete picture.
Combining that visibility with government authorities could potentially produce a more comprehensive understanding of criminal networks.
The Biggest Question Is Accountability
The expansion of offensive capability also creates a difficult question: who is responsible when something goes wrong?
A defensive mistake can expose a
That makes oversight more than an administrative requirement. It becomes a central component of national-security risk management.
Attribution Will Remain Difficult
Cyber attribution is notoriously complicated.
Criminals can use compromised servers, proxy infrastructure, stolen credentials, rented cloud resources, false identities, and other layers designed to conceal their origin.
If the government authorizes an operation against the wrong infrastructure because attribution is incorrect, the consequences could be considerably more serious than an ordinary cybersecurity error.
Criminal Groups May Respond by Changing Infrastructure
A predictable response from sophisticated cybercriminal organizations will be adaptation.
Threat actors may migrate infrastructure more frequently, compartmentalize operations, use additional layers of obfuscation, move communications to harder-to-monitor platforms, or reduce the amount of infrastructure that remains continuously online.
Offensive pressure could therefore create an arms race between government-backed defenders and criminal operators.
The Policy Could Reshape the Cybersecurity Industry
The initiative may also influence the commercial cybersecurity market.
Companies with advanced threat-intelligence and offensive-security capabilities could become strategically important government partners. Specialized firms may find new opportunities, while organizations lacking mature security controls may struggle to meet the program’s eligibility requirements.
Cybersecurity could increasingly blur the line between commercial defense, intelligence support, and national-security operations.
Smaller Security Firms Could Gain Strategic Importance
The inclusion of smaller companies is particularly noteworthy.
A small cybersecurity firm with extraordinary expertise in one malware family, one criminal ecosystem, one region, or one technical discipline could potentially offer capabilities that a much larger organization cannot easily reproduce.
The memorandum explicitly recognizes this possibility by requiring eligibility criteria that accommodate specialized and agile companies.
International Law Remains a Critical Boundary
Offensive cyber operations do not happen in a legal vacuum.
The memorandum requires program activities to comply with the Constitution, applicable U.S. laws, and U.S. international obligations. It also specifically distinguishes operations that could rise to the level of a use of force or armed attack.
That distinction could become increasingly important as cyber operations against criminal organizations cross borders and potentially touch infrastructure in countries where the criminals themselves are not physically located.
The Difference Between Cybercrime and State Activity Could Become Blurred
The memorandum defines qualifying organizations as foreign groups engaged in cyber-enabled crime against U.S. government interests, U.S. persons, or U.S. interests, while excluding organizations that are institutional parts of a foreign government or wholly operated under a foreign government’s direction.
That creates an important strategic boundary.
A criminal organization may appear independent while maintaining relationships with state actors, intelligence services, or politically motivated groups. Determining where criminal activity ends and state-sponsored activity begins can become extremely complicated.
Deep Analysis: Commands, Controls, and Operational Boundaries
Command Authority
The first major control is command authority. Participating companies operate under the direction and oversight of the federal government rather than independently choosing targets.
Written Authorization
Every cyber-operation package requires review and written approval before action can begin. This creates a documented chain of authorization.
Federal Supervision
Operations are conducted exclusively on behalf of and under the supervision of the federal government pursuant to lawful authorities.
DOJ and DHS Oversight
The Department of Justice and Department of Homeland Security receive central roles through the program’s two executive directors.
National Coordination Center
The NCC becomes the coordinating hub for the program and is responsible for managing the operational framework.
Target Restriction
Operations must target qualifying foreign cyber-enabled transnational criminal organizations rather than arbitrary foreign systems.
Intelligence Collection
Cyber Surveillance Operations are designed primarily to collect information or intelligence, potentially including intelligence useful for later operations.
Cyber Effects
Cyber Effects Operations can manipulate, disrupt, deny, degrade, or destroy targeted digital infrastructure or information.
Legal Compliance
The program must operate consistently with the Constitution, federal law, and applicable international obligations.
U.S. Persons
Special procedures apply when an operation involves or could unintentionally affect U.S. persons.
Domestic Infrastructure
Unintended targeting of systems located in the United States requires immediate operational cessation and notification procedures.
Minimization
If an operation exceeds its approved parameters, participating companies must conduct minimization procedures before continuing under government direction.
Critical Outcomes
Operations likely to cause death or serious injury are excluded from the standard authorization mechanism.
Armed Attack Threshold
Operations likely to rise to the level of a use of force or armed attack under international law are also excluded from the standard process.
Operational Deconfliction
The program must coordinate activity across multiple federal agencies and elements of the U.S. intelligence community.
Company Vetting
Participating firms must satisfy technical, personnel, security, reliability, and operational requirements.
Large Companies
Large cybersecurity companies can participate because they can provide substantial operational capacity.
Specialized Companies
Smaller firms can participate when their agility or specialized expertise offers unique value.
Contractual Accountability
Companies must sign agreements with DOJ or DHS establishing their responsibilities and operational obligations.
Financial Accountability
The government may require a bond or escrow of at least $1 million as a compliance mechanism.
Threat Intelligence
Private organizations can provide threat information gathered during ordinary business activities to participating companies for potential proposals to the NCC.
Government Leads
Federal, state, local, tribal, and territorial agencies can identify CE-TCO threats for consideration by participating companies.
Reporting
Participating companies must provide information about their operational activity and the impact of foreign cyber-enabled criminal organizations.
Annual Evaluation
Companies must be evaluated for continued participation at least once every year.
Program Reporting
The
Automation
The memorandum directs the NCC to use automation where appropriate to streamline elements of the program while remaining within applicable legal requirements.
Strategic Objective
The broader objective is to make the United States faster and more capable of confronting cyber-enabled transnational criminal organizations by combining government authority with private-sector expertise.
What Undercode Say:
A Major Strategic Shift
This is one of the more consequential developments in U.S. cybercrime policy because it changes the role private cybersecurity companies may play in government operations.
Not Ordinary Hack Back
Calling this simply “legalized hack back” would be misleading. The memorandum establishes a government-controlled framework rather than giving companies independent authority to attack threat actors.
The Offensive Element Is Real
At the same time, the offensive capability should not be minimized. The official definition expressly includes unauthorized access for intelligence collection and operations capable of disrupting or destroying digital infrastructure.
Ransomware Is a Natural Target
Ransomware ecosystems are among the clearest potential beneficiaries of the new approach because they depend heavily on infrastructure that can be tracked, mapped, and disrupted.
Intelligence Could Be the Biggest Weapon
The ability to quietly obtain intelligence from criminal systems may ultimately be more valuable than destroying individual servers.
Criminal Networks Are Connected
Modern cybercrime is an ecosystem. One ransomware operation can involve affiliates, access brokers, hosting providers, cryptocurrency services, and data-extortion infrastructure.
Infrastructure Disruption Can Create Pressure
Government-directed disruption could increase the cost of operating those ecosystems and force criminal organizations to spend more resources rebuilding their infrastructure.
Criminals Will Adapt
Threat actors are unlikely to remain passive. They will probably respond by improving compartmentalization, infrastructure rotation, encryption, operational security, and attribution resistance.
Attribution Becomes Critical
The stronger the
A Mistake Could Be Expensive
An offensive operation that accidentally reaches unrelated infrastructure could have consequences far beyond an ordinary cybersecurity incident.
Oversight Must Be Strong
Written approvals, legal review, reporting, annual evaluations, and operational controls will therefore be central to the credibility of the program.
Private Expertise Is Valuable
The government cannot independently reproduce every capability developed by the commercial cybersecurity industry.
Threat Intelligence Is a Force Multiplier
Security companies see enormous volumes of malicious activity across their customers and networks. Bringing that intelligence into government operations could provide a significant advantage.
Smaller Firms Matter
The inclusion of smaller specialized firms could prove especially valuable because niche expertise often determines whether a complex operation succeeds.
The $1 Million Bond Matters
The potential financial requirement signals that participating companies will be treated as accountable operational partners rather than ordinary vendors.
Government Control Is the Defining Feature
The most important sentence in the entire policy may be the requirement that participating companies operate under federal government control and oversight.
Domestic Protections Are Important
The memorandum specifically addresses unintended effects against U.S. persons and systems inside the United States.
International Consequences Remain
Cyber operations conducted against infrastructure overseas can create diplomatic and legal complications even when the intended target is criminal.
Criminal Versus State Actor
The
Cybercrime Is Becoming a National-Security Issue
Ransomware, fraud, cryptocurrency theft, and cyber-enabled extortion can generate consequences extending far beyond individual victims.
The Private Sector Is Already on the Front Line
Cybersecurity companies have effectively been investigating criminal networks for years. This memorandum formalizes a pathway for some of that expertise to support government-directed operations.
The Battlefield Is Becoming More Integrated
The separation between government cyber operations and private-sector cybersecurity is becoming less rigid.
Defense and Offense Are Converging
Organizations that once focused primarily on detecting malicious activity may increasingly find themselves participating in intelligence-driven disruption.
Legal Boundaries Will Matter More
As offensive capabilities expand, questions involving authorization, jurisdiction, privacy, proportionality, and international law will become increasingly important.
Transparency Will Be Difficult
Because some operational information will inevitably be sensitive or classified, outside observers may have limited visibility into how the program actually operates.
Success Will Be Measured by Disruption
The true test will not be the number of operations conducted. It will be whether criminal networks become less capable, less profitable, and more vulnerable to identification and prosecution.
Ransomware Economics Could Change
If threat actors face a greater probability of infrastructure disruption, their operating costs could rise and their business models could become more difficult to sustain.
Criminal Infrastructure May Fragment
Pressure could encourage threat actors to split their infrastructure into smaller, more isolated components.
Cybercrime Could Become More Expensive
Increased operational risk may force criminal groups to invest more heavily in security, hosting, anonymity, and contingency infrastructure.
Offensive Cyber Is Not Risk-Free
Every additional offensive capability introduces the possibility of unintended consequences.
Government Oversight Is the Safety Mechanism
The
The Next 60 Days Matter
The implementation rules will determine how much practical power this memorandum actually creates.
The First Operations Will Set the Tone
Early cases will likely shape how cybersecurity companies, criminal groups, allies, and foreign governments understand the program.
The Cybersecurity Industry Is Watching
For security companies, the initiative could eventually create a new category of government partnership unlike traditional incident-response contracts.
The Threat Landscape Is Changing
The policy reflects a broader reality: cybercrime is becoming too fast, global, and technically sophisticated for governments to rely exclusively on traditional investigative methods.
The Real Test Is Execution
The memorandum is strategically ambitious. Its long-term impact will depend on whether the United States can combine speed with disciplined authorization, accurate intelligence, legal compliance, and effective oversight.
✅ The White House Memorandum Is Real
The White House published the memorandum titled “Expanding Capabilities to Combat Transnational Cyber-Enabled Crime” on August 12, 2026. It establishes a program for vetted U.S. companies to conduct government-authorized cyber operations against qualifying foreign cyber-enabled transnational criminal organizations.
✅ Offensive Cyber Operations Are Explicitly Included
The claim that the program covers offensive activity is supported by the official text. The memorandum defines Cyber Effects Operations to include manipulation, disruption, denial, degradation, and destruction, while Cyber Surveillance Operations can involve unauthorized access intended to collect intelligence.
❌ It Is Not Independent Private-Sector “Hack Back”
The viral description could easily be interpreted as giving companies autonomous permission to attack criminals, but that is not what the memorandum says. Participating companies must operate under federal government control, receive written approval and direction, and follow government-established procedures.
Prediction
(+1) Stronger Pressure on Ransomware Infrastructure
Government-directed access and disruption capabilities could make it significantly harder for some ransomware groups to maintain stable infrastructure.
(+1) Greater Government-Private Cybersecurity Cooperation
The program is likely to deepen cooperation between federal agencies and specialized cybersecurity companies, particularly in threat intelligence and advanced incident investigation.
(+1) More Importance for Specialized Cybersecurity Firms
Smaller companies with highly specialized offensive-security, intelligence, malware, or infrastructure expertise could become increasingly attractive government partners.
(+1) Better Intelligence on Criminal Ecosystems
If implemented effectively, the program could provide investigators with deeper insight into how ransomware and cyber-fraud organizations operate.
(-1) More Sophisticated Criminal Countermeasures
Threat actors are likely to respond by increasing infrastructure rotation, compartmentalization, operational security, and other measures designed to frustrate government-directed operations.
(-1) Greater Risk of Attribution Errors
Offensive cyber activity creates a higher consequence for mistakes. Misidentifying infrastructure or targeting systems controlled by innocent parties could produce serious operational and diplomatic problems.
(-1) International Legal and Diplomatic Tensions
Cross-border cyber operations may trigger disputes with countries where targeted infrastructure is physically located, even when the United States identifies the ultimate target as a criminal organization.
(-1) Potential for Cyber Escalation
As governments become more willing to disrupt criminal infrastructure directly, criminal groups may respond with more aggressive attacks against government agencies, critical infrastructure, or private companies.
The Bigger Picture
The most important takeaway is not that private cybersecurity companies have suddenly been given permission to conduct unrestricted cyberattacks. They have not.
The bigger development is that the U.S. government has created a formal mechanism for bringing selected private-sector capabilities into government-directed offensive cyber operations against foreign cyber-enabled criminal organizations.
That distinction matters enormously.
The cybersecurity industry has spent years building visibility into ransomware groups, fraud networks, malware campaigns, and criminal infrastructure. The new policy attempts to turn some of that accumulated knowledge into an operational extension of U.S. government power.
The success or failure of the initiative will ultimately depend on execution. If the United States can combine private-sector speed and expertise with government intelligence, legal authority, careful attribution, and strict oversight, the program could significantly increase pressure on some of the world’s most persistent cybercriminal networks.
But offensive cyber power carries risks that defensive cybersecurity does not. A mistake can cross borders, affect unrelated systems, expose sensitive information, or create consequences that cannot easily be reversed.
The August 12 memorandum therefore marks more than another cybersecurity policy announcement. It signals a broader shift in how Washington intends to fight transnational cybercrime: not simply by defending against criminal attacks, but by using government-authorized offensive capabilities to pursue and disrupt the infrastructure behind them.
Official Source
The White House memorandum was issued on August 12, 2026, and provides the formal legal and operational framework for the program.
Read the full White House memorandum
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