The UK government has revealed its plans for a National Cyber Security Centre (NCSC) to take on online crime, fraud and the like.
Ciaran Martin has been appointed chief exec of the NCSC that will report into GCHQ.
He says: “The Centre will bring together the capabilities already developed by CESG – the Information Security arm of GCHQ – the Centre for the Protection of National Infrastructure, CERT-UK and the Centre for Cyber Assessment, allowing us to build on the best of what we already have, whilst significantly simplifying the current arrangements.”
As Matt Hancock, Minister for Cabinet Office said of the new initiative: “When peoples’ cyber security isn’t up to scratch, you just need a laptop and an Internet connection. The tech may have got smarter, but the biggest weakness in any system is still the human being. In the last year, 2 thirds of large businesses in the UK experienced an cyber attack. Almost a quarter suffered a breach at least once a month. This matters because we are one of the world’s leading digital nations. Twelve and a half per cent of our economy is now online. No other country does more e-commerce.”
