Security News

An article published today by the UK National Cyber Security Centre suggests there is a "Realistic possibility" that by 2025, the most sophisticated attackers' tools will improve markedly thanks to AI models informed by data describing successful cyber-hits. At the lower end, cyber criminals who employ social engineering are expected to enjoy a significant boost thanks to the wide-scale uptake of consumer-grade generative AI tools such as ChatGPT, Google Bard, and Microsoft Copilot.

About Bruce Schneier I am a public-interest technologist, working at the intersection of security, technology, and people. I've been writing about security issues on my blog since 2004, and in my monthly newsletter since 1998.

Joshua Bowles, a former Government Communications Headquarters programmer, attacked the individual in March following at least a month of planning, police said. Bowles visited the leisure center four weeks prior to the attack after researching the victim extensively to plan out the attack.

Former foreign secretary Dominic Raab rebuked GCHQ for secretly halting internal compliance audits that ensured the spy agency was obeying the law, a government report has revealed - while just 0.06 per cent of spying requests made by Britain's public sector were refused by its supposed overseer. Explaining how GCHQ's COVID excuse "Deviated from our expectations," IPCO said: "The IPC and the Foreign Secretary made clear to GCHQ that, in future, they expect GCHQ to inform them of any changes relevant to the handling of warranted data."

Britain's National Cyber Security Centre is prepared to share its cyber defence tech and threat intel feeds with British organisations in need of extra help, it said at the launch of its annual review today. You probably don't want the country's DNS being run by GCHQ! Chief techie Ian Levy highlighted the NCSC's Protective DNS service to The Register as one example of good things the cyber defence organisation has done, with the custom DNS resolver service being used by 1,000 NHS supply chain firms to prevent their devices visiting known malicious web domains.

The UK's Government Communications Headquarters boss Sir Jeremy Fleming has outlined a plan to pursue criminal actors who deploy ransomware as well as the state actors that are aware of their efforts. Speaking remotely to The Cipher Brief Annual Threat Conference on Monday, Fleming discussed the increasing threat of cybercrime - in particular ransomware - and GCHQ's strategy to reduce threats.

GCHQ director Jeremy Fleming on Friday delivered the 2021 Vincent Briscoe Lecture for the Institute for Security, Science and Technology, and opened with an observation that humans love to connect to each other, that digital connectivity continues to become more pervasive and important, and that Britain is "a big animal in the digital world." China's size and technological weight means that it has the potential to control the global operating system.

Conservative MP Tom Tugendhat has publicly claimed GCHQ sources told him Gmail was more secure than Parliament's own Microsoft Office 365 deployment - but both Parliament and a GCHQ offshoot have told him to stop being silly. "I was told by friends at GCHQ that I was better off sticking to Gmail rather than using the parliamentary system because it was more secure," Tugendhat told the BBC's Today Programme.

Increasing numbers of senior ex-GCHQ people have called for laws preventing businesses using cyber insurance to buy off ransomware attackers - with the money merely perpetuating the criminals' business model. Marcus Willett, a senior cyber adviser with the International Institute for Strategic Studies and former GCHQ director of cyber, wrote at the end of March that the world needs "New laws establishing disincentives to pay ransoms to cyber criminals."

The National Cyber Security Centre picked its London HQ building not because it was the best or most cost-efficient location - but because the agency "Prioritised image over cost", a Parliamentary committee has said. NCSC's HQ in the English capital's Nova South development, a glitzy commercial building near Westminster, was procured in breach of GCHQ's own rules on leasing commercial buildings.