Enhancing national security with public-private partnerships

The role of public-private partnerships in national security
 

Across interconnected and evolving digital and physical landscapes, governments constantly face potential threats to national security. These threats can be persistent—such as when one criminal enterprise starts up in a power vacuum left by the takedown of another—or sporadic and intense, catalyzed by changes in foreign policy or global events.

These increasingly sophisticated and complex threats to national security can present public-sector agencies with opportunities to partner with the private sector. Public-private partnerships (PPPs) are contractual arrangements between a government entity and a private sector company to deliver public services and infrastructure, often over a long-term period, and involve both sides sharing the risks, responsibilities, and rewards. Governments can benefit from the private sector’s emerging technologies, deeper data, and agility, while private companies can develop technology to align with real-life use cases to benefit the public good.

This article explores ten ways PPPs can offer governments a strategic edge when it comes to protecting national security:
 

Public-private partnerships improve information sharing and technical capabilities
 

1. Technological innovation

The private sector often leads in technological innovation due to competitive pressures and the need for profitability. Its rapid advancements—especially in artificial intelligence and machine learning (AI/ML)—are invaluable to national security agencies. The sector has also developed automated methods for collecting and processing vast amounts of data, with powerful analytics tools to aid quicker and more informed decision-making. Harnessing the private sector’s technical capabilities and time-to-innovation can help agencies achieve efficiencies by shifting time spent from manually gathering data across disparate sources to analyzing and acting on intelligence.

2. Live information sharing

Up-to-date, verified information plays an important role in national security and defense. A collaborative approach between the public and private sector helps broaden the scope of intelligence gathering and supports government agencies in understanding threats on a deeper level, potentially contributing to better operational readiness and responsiveness.

For example, financial intelligence units (FIUs) in Europe are aiming toward better intelligence sharing, as required by the 2024 EU Anti-Money Laundering package and bolstered by the 2025 FIU.net upgrades and 2025 Telecoms Fraud Charter.^1,2 From 2026-2028, the European Commission states that it aims to “support the deployment of secured information sharing capacities between Member States, Europol and other security agencies.”³ Similarly, the UK's National Crime Agency demonstrated successful public-private information sharing in its 2024 campaign to partner with seven banks, which contributed to the identification of over a dozen new and suspicious criminal networks and generated additional leads for the agency’s top ongoing investigations.⁴ In the United States, defense, intelligence, and law enforcement agencies cite international information sharing as an effective threat disruptor, with the Department of Homeland Security long prioritizing information sharing across traditional boundaries to address information shortfalls.^5,6

Another initiative in the APAC region is the 2024 Collaborative Sharing of Money Laundering/Terrorism Financing Information & Cases, better known as COSMIC, a two-year initiative developed by the Monetary Authority of Singapore and six major banks.⁷ COSMIC is a digital platform that allows financial institutions (FIs) to share customer information to support efforts to address money laundering, terrorism financing, and proliferation financing. This system facilitates information sharing based on established indicators of potentially suspicious activity, while seeking to protect legitimate customers' interests. FIs must follow strict policies to keep shared information confidential, demonstrating that it's possible to share crucial intelligence without compromising customer privacy.
 

3. Specialized expertise

The private sector often possesses specialized knowledge that national security agencies can utilize to enhance operations and decision-making processes. Engaging with private firms can enable national security agencies to make use of access to the latest proprietary industry knowledge and specialized skills that may not be readily available within public sector organizations. By partnering with private enterprises to harness the current tools and systems, such as non-traditional corporate, financial, and trade intelligence, governments may be able to act with greater operational awareness and decision dominance, which may lead to more certainty and freedom of action in contested spaces. In short, PPPs may help support efforts to keep national security measures both current and robust.
 

4. Tools for pattern analysis

Managing security risks is a complex task that benefits from diverse perspectives and expertise across the public and private sectors. PPPs can allow for the development of detailed strategic operations to mitigate potential threats. For example, criminals tend to employ similar methods to evade detection, including shadow fleet vessels for sanctions evasions, vulnerable trafficking entry points, and legitimate entities like shell companies to obscure illicit activities. Analyzing criminal methods by combining commercial data and government intel within a unified platform is often valuable for maximum pattern detection, targeting, and providing greater public transparency into security actions. By analyzing common evasion tactics with both classified and commercial data, governments can support the development of more effective strategies to detect illicit activities.
 

Public-private partnerships support threat monitoring and interdiction
 

5. Cybersecurity

In an era where the attack surface is multiplied—both by an organization’s connections to upstream and downstream vendors as well as the increasing sophistication of artificial intelligence (AI)-fueled cyberattack campaigns—cybersecurity is a shared concern between both governments and the private sector. Even organizations with robust security measures are not immune to the potential domino effect caused by digital infrastructure weaknesses within their supply chain.

The three ways a supplier can expose you to cyber risks are:

• Data breach: a common issue is when a cyberattack against a supplier exposes sensitive data
• System breach: less common but potentially significant is when a cyberattack on a service provider, who has access to government systems, allows cybercriminals to gain access to nonpublic, confidential, and sensitive information
• Supplier breach: cyberattacks on a specific supplier that can cause them to go offline, which could jeopardize the continuity of an agency’s digital ecosystem

Partnering with private sector companies who meet U.S. government cloud security requirements (e.g. FedRAMP-authorized solutions or emerging frameworks such as FedRAMP 20x), or similar international standards of cyber defense excellence, for solutions such as cybersecurity risk scores can provide government agencies with enhanced frontline offensive and defensive visibility. With standardized insights into potential attack surfaces throughout their supply chain, governments may be able to implement higher and more consistent supplier security standards and better manage their risk of cyber attack.
 

6. Counterterrorism

PPPs bring together diverse expertise and resources to support the development of methods to disrupt terrorists and transnational crime networks.  Working together can improve governments’ ability to detect high-risk networks of public and private entities and the financing associated with these terrorist groups, which can destabilize national security and economic prosperity.

A paper by the Wolfsberg Group, an association of 12 global banks, shares key opportunities for developing an effective anti-money laundering/counter-terrorism financing (AML/CFT) program through public-private information sharing.⁹ It points out how FIs can aid authorities by providing data related to possible terrorism financing risks, but this should be complemented by consistent feedback from national authorities on the value of reports, communication of financial crime risk priority areas and typologies, and clear legal frameworks for data sharing with the government and peer FIs. As one example, the latter guideline is addressed by Singapore’s COSMIC program, which launched a secure information sharing ecosystem between six national banks to help scale investigations. The communication of a specific set of priorities to reduce wholesale de-risking and a shift toward more open, multi-directional communication, while upholding strict privacy protections, presents a strategic opportunity for PPPs focused on AML/CFT. This approach could accelerate the creation of innovative, yet personal data–secure counterterrorism techniques.
 

7. Global security events and legislation

National security agencies and private enterprises can work together on global security efforts to promote peace and stability within and beyond their own borders. PPPs can provide valuable insights that help inform policymaking across a range of security areas, including energy, military, economic, environmental, and human security. For example, the 2019 US Protecting Europe's Energy Security Act (PEESA) introduced sanctions related to certain Russian energy pipeline projects to address associated national security risks.¹⁰ PPPs may also indirectly inform policy discussions related to legislation such as PEESA through their role in supporting the analysis of alternative energy sources to help reduce supply disruptions on a national scale.
 

8. Emerging threats

The private sector can support national security agencies through its capacity to quickly respond to new and emerging threats. Criminal enterprises are now multi-domain, for example, using AI cyber attack agents built on infrastructure hyperscalers to disrupt critical operations on land, at sea, in space, and in air. Private sector companies’ ability to work across jurisdictions and domains, as well as adapt to evolving criminal behaviors, illustrates the potential value of a strategic shift toward collaborative public-private investigations.
 

Public-private partnerships enhance the stability of systems
 

9. Resource optimization

Governments frequently face budget pressures and public financial accountability, which can restrict or slow national security missions. Private companies, on the other hand, can often operate with increased agility, in part due to differences in resource structures and operational constraints. Working with the private sector can help governments access and share external resources, which may reduce duplicate efforts, allow each sector to play to its strengths, and ultimately lead to higher quality results with a more efficient use of public resources. Greater resource efficiency can help public authorities carry out the wide range of security measures aimed at supporting the protection of critical infrastructure and the public.
 

10. Economic stability

Public-private partnerships can play an important role in bolstering economic stability, a foundational pillar of national security. Collaboration between government entities and private businesses can support innovation, contribute to infrastructure development, and help create jobs. This synergy may support economic diversification, which can contribute to resilience against shocks and disruptions. PPPs can also help align resources and expertise, leading to more efficient project implementation and public finance cost savings. These potential benefits may collectively contribute to economic stability and growth, which are fundamental to broader national security objectives.
 

More than a pragmatic choice—a national imperative

For some nations, PPPs are more than a pragmatic way to enhance their agency’s technical capabilities—they can be a strategic imperative because of their potential to strengthen the very fabric of a nation's security. Public-private partnerships can do so by helping to fill information gaps and harnessing specialized tools designed to support the identification and mitigation of potential national security threats like terrorism, cybersecurity attacks, geopolitical events, economic and financial instability. Through shared knowledge, resources, and innovation, public-private partnerships may be a key contributing factor in building a safer, more secure future. 

Working with private technology partners like Moody’s
 

Governments can use technology providers such as Moody’s, who offer company reference data and an investigations platform to identify potential patterns, support analysis of emerging and evolving threats, and help inform more informed decision-making in complex environments.

Learn more about Moody’s work with national security agencies, as well as other public sector agencies, or please reach out to learn more about tailored use cases for your government organization.

Related content

Moody’s Risk Reframed podcast episode, Bridging the gap: Public-private partnerships in AML and financial crime
 

References

1. htps://thefinancialcrimenews.com/eu-article-75-pan-eu-information-sharing-is-coming-but-will-it-be-enough/
2. https://finance.ec.europa.eu/news/next-generation-fiunet-2025-02-04_en
3. https://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-content/EN/TXT/?uri=celex:52025DC0349
4. https://natlawreview.com/article/promising-results-groundbreaking-fincrime-data-sharing-project-between-seven-uk
5. https://www.dni.gov/files/ODNI/documents/assessments/ATA-2026-Unclassified-Report.pdf
6. https://www.dhs.gov/information-sharing
7. https://www.mas.gov.sg/news/media-releases/2024/mas-launches-cosmic-platform
8. https://www.nato.int/en/what-we-do/deterrence-and-defence/cyber-defence
9. https://db.wolfsberg-group.org/assets/f789b205-c409-4ef0-8217-c47a4990ba9d/Wolfsberg%20Effectiveness%20Through%20Collaboration.pdf
10. https://www.congress.gov/bill/116th-congress/senate-bill/1441