This document introduces the Border Gateway Protocol (BGP), explains its importance to the internet, and provides a set of best practices that can help in protecting BGP. Best practices described here are intended to be implementable on nearly all currently available BGP routers. While a number of enhanced protocols for BGP have been proposed, these generally require substantial changes to the protocol and may not interoperate with current BGP implementations. To improve the security of BGP routers, the recommendations listed below are introduced. While the recommendations can contribute to greatly improved BGP security, they are not a complete defense against all threats. Security administrators and decision makers should select and apply these methods based on their unique needs.