FIRST Announces New CORE Initiative with Fortinet as a Founding Partner

June 23, 2025 - The Forum of Incident Response and Security Teams (FIRST), a leading global cybersecurity non-profit, today introduced its CORE (Community, Operational capacity, Resilience, and Empowerment) initiative with Fortinet as its founding partner.

FIRST CORE is a strategic program designed to enhance incident response capabilities around the world, sharing the expertise and insights of the global incident response community through tailored initiatives to help improve cybersecurity. This new effort will build on FIRST's long history of education, training, and knowledge sharing within the international cybersecurity community.

"Fortinet's leadership as our founding partner demonstrates their commitment to strengthening cybersecurity knowledge across industries and borders. Together, we're building communities grounded in internationally recognized best practices that will enhance incident response capabilities across the globe." said Chris Gibson, CEO, FIRST. FIRST CORE will provide critical funding to expand the organization's Community and Capacity Building Program (CCB), which focuses on developing incident response capabilities in regions where resources are limited. This program builds on FIRST's long history of education, training, and knowledge sharing within the international security community.

• Developing new and updated incident response training content
• Subsidizing local training costs for lower-income partners
• Enhancing Suguru Yamaguchi Fellowship Program opportunities to assist teams from underrepresented regions and with national responsibility to engage with and join the Global FIRST community
• Establishing a network of regional liaisons and mentors

CORE represents a significant step forward in FIRST's mission to foster collaboration among incident response teams worldwide. The FIRST team is already working on initiatives with response and security teams in Africa and the Caribbean. CORE funding will significantly expand this work to additional regions, including the Asia-Pacific and Latin America. “Fortinet has collaborated with FIRST for more than a decade and is deeply committed to driving public-private partnership efforts that address cybersecurity risk to society,” said Derek Manky, Chief Security Strategist and Global Vice President of Threat Intelligence, Fortinet. “FIRST CORE represents a unique opportunity to provide boots-on-the-ground support to security teams around the world, particularly in under resourced regions, and we’re proud to be the founding partner of this important initiative. Creating new avenues for defenders everywhere to share knowledge and best practices ultimately give us more opportunities to collectively disrupt global cybercrime.”

"FIRST CORE is designed to be responsive to the needs of our partners on the ground, with initiatives directly informed by the priorities of security teams worldwide," explained Klée Aiken, Director, Community and Capacity Building, FIRST. "This adaptability is crucial in cybersecurity's evolving threat landscape. Together, with Fortinet’s combined contribution, FIRST CORE's impact will grow, enabling us to better share expertise across the global incident response community."

Fortinet's contribution marks a significant step forward in building resilience to cyber threats around the world. Organizations interested in becoming members of CORE are encouraged to contact FIRST for more information at CCB@FIRST.org.

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Issued on behalf of FIRST. For further information please contact FIRST Press.

About FIRST

FIRST aspires to bring together incident response and security teams from every country across the world to ensure a safe internet for all. Founded in 1990, the Forum of Incident Response and Security Teams (FIRST) consists of internet emergency response teams from more than 800 corporations, government bodies, universities and other institutions across 110 countries in the Americas, Asia, Europe, Africa, and Oceania. For more information and to see the full calendar of events, visit: FIRST.Org.

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