Informally known as the "Cyber Peace Institute," the organization plans to act as a neutral arbiter that calls out bad behavior on the internet.

The tech giant last week executed a court order and shut down six internet domains set up by the Kremlin-linked hacking group known as Fancy Bear.

The participant companies' principles include not helping any government mount a cyberattack against "innocent citizens and enterprises."

Ashton Carter, who was President Barack Obama's secretary of Defense, seemed to suggest that the complex relationship between national security agencies and the private sector has turned a corner in recent years.

Microsoft President Brad Smith renewed his call for a "digital Geneva convention," adding a new wrinkle: the suggestion that the world's IT companies and their cyber first responders should be recognized as kind of "tech Red Cross" — neutral players who should remain unmolested by combatants on the cyber-battlefield.