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Keep your existing incident-response tabletop format, but add AI-specific decision points. Test whether responders can identify the affected AI system and its role, obtain the system and vulnerability details they need, involve internal owners and outside providers, and decide what information to share. CISA’s voluntary AI collaboration guidance and exercise resources offer a practical starting point; they do not require every organization to adopt a separate AI response plan or a universal exercise format.
Why a conventional cyber tabletop may miss important AI context
A tabletop can still use familiar scenarios such as phishing, ransomware, or insider threats. The gap is often in what the exercise asks participants to establish once the incident touches an AI system: which system is affected, what it does operationally, what technical details are available, and who outside the organization may need to coordinate.
CISA’s Joint Cyber Defense Collaborative (JCDC) AI Cyber Tabletop Exercise says it focused on capturing information beyond conventional cybersecurity incidents to help identify operational gaps, opportunities, and risks associated with AI. That supports adding AI-system context to exercises; it does not establish that AI-related incidents are more frequent or more damaging than other incidents. Read CISA’s JCDC AI Cyber Tabletop Exercise.
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Begin with your current incident-response plan and an exercise format your team already understands. Keep a relevant baseline scenario, then add AI-specific injects only where they could change a decision, a response, or recovery. For each inject, have participants work through the following questions:
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- Identify the system and its operational role. What AI-enabled service or workflow is affected, and what business or operational function depends on it?
- Establish what responders need to know. Which logs, model or service details, dependencies, and vulnerability information would help determine scope and next steps? Who can provide them?
- Bring in the right people. Which internal system owners and technical, business, legal, communications, or leadership roles should participate? Which external provider or partner may need to join?
- Test information-sharing decisions. What can be communicated to employees, customers, providers, or other partners, by whom, and through which channels? What information is needed for coordination?
- Surface approvals and recovery choices. Which response or recovery decisions require executive approval, and what operational consequences follow from each option?
These prompts are practical design recommendations based on CISA’s AI collaboration focus and its general exercise materials, not a quoted CISA checklist.
Choose a scenario that fits your organization
CISA’s Cybersecurity Tabletop Exercise Package (CTEP) includes planning and facilitator materials, participant feedback resources, and an after-action report template. Its scenario library covers ransomware, insider threats, phishing, and industrial control system compromise. Use the scenario that best reflects your organization’s risks, then tailor it rather than treating the package as a fixed AI exercise. See CISA’s CTEP Package Documents and browse its Cybersecurity Scenarios.
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Phishing or ransomware disrupts an AI-enabled workflow
Start with a familiar compromise, then introduce an operational consequence: an AI-enabled process is unavailable, produces an unexpected result, or cannot be trusted while the incident is investigated. Ask what evidence would establish whether the AI system itself is affected or whether the disruption is elsewhere in the workflow.
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Introduce a vulnerability affecting an AI system or one of its dependencies. Ask who contacts the provider, what system and vulnerability information responders need, and how the organization will coordinate response and recovery while the details are being established.
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System behavior is suspicious but not yet classified
Present behavior that raises concern without immediately labeling it a conventional compromise. Have participants identify what they know, what remains uncertain, and what additional information or expertise is needed before making containment or service-restoration decisions. These are scenario adaptations, not an official CISA taxonomy.
Use CISA’s AI guidance as a voluntary coordination resource
CISA announced the JCDC AI Cybersecurity Collaboration Playbook on January 14, 2025. The agency describes it as voluntary guidance for government, industry, and international partners to share information about AI-related cybersecurity incidents and vulnerabilities. CISA urges JCDC partners to integrate it into incident-response and information-sharing processes and improve those processes iteratively; the guidance is not a universal legal obligation. Read CISA’s announcement and access the playbook.
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For broader preparation materials, NIST’s Incident Response: Preparation Resources page links to CISA playbooks and tabletop packages as well as NIST exercise guidance. NIST’s AI Risk Management Framework page also identifies its Generative AI Profile, released July 26, 2024. The profile is background for AI risk management, not a tabletop script.
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Close with a facilitated review while decisions and information gaps are fresh. Record specific owners and follow-up actions rather than ending with a general list of lessons.
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- What information was missing, and who is responsible for obtaining or documenting it?
- Who had decision authority, and did participants know when approval was needed?
- Which teams or external providers were absent but should be included next time?
- What information-sharing or external-coordination step needs to change?
- Which response protocol, communication process, or recovery plan should be updated, and who will make the update?
CISA’s CTEP materials say an exercise can be used to update information-sharing processes, emergency response protocols, and recovery plans, policies, and procedures. The CTEP Package Documents page is listed as revised February 2, 2023. Consult the package documents and after-action resources.
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