The Five Eyes countries released the new joint Cybersecurity Best Practices for Smart Cities guide on 19 April 2023, which aims to help ensure that connected technologies are integrated into infrastructure to protect systems and data. 

The report highlights the potential benefits to communities in terms of reduced costs and improved quality of life but warns of the need to balance these benefits against the risks, such as the expanded and interconnected attack surface, supply chain risks and infrastructure vulnerability to automation. To understand the risks and how to mitigate them, councils considering adopting smart city technologies are encouraged to consult this new guidance.

This guidance is the result of joint work by the US Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA), the National Security Agency (NSA), the United States Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), the United Kingdom National Cyber Security Security Centre (NCSC-UK), the Australian Cyber Security Centre (ACSC), the Canadian Centre for Cyber Security Security Centre (CCCS) and the New Zealand National Cyber Security Centre (NCSC-NZ).