Infosecurity

UK launches cybersecurity agency

By Robin Hicks | 2 July 2009

One month after the United States government announced that it was to appoint a ‘cyber czar’, the United Kingdom is following suit with the formation of a cybersecurity agency.

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The UK’s Office of Cyber Security (OCS) will serve to protect the country’s IT infrastructure, and will be created in line with a model proposed in the US, according to UK government officials.

As well as cyber-defence and cyber-attack coordination, the OCS will act as a conduit for information security collaboration between the Ministry of Defence, the intelligence services, the police, and industry experts.

The OCS will also have a role in coordinating cyber-offence capabilities that will build on the government’s existing resources.

A Cabinet Office official said: “Information assurance has been about building stronger walls, but there’s only so much you can do. You come to a point when you are allowing criminals and others a low risk in continuing to attack, and there comes a time when that has to change. This is the first time we are saying publicly we are not going to sit back.”

The OCS is part of Prime Minister Gordon Brown’s (pictured) 2009 National Security Strategy, which includes an IT security component (called the Cyber Security Strategy 2009) for the first time.

Government interest in cyberwarfare was heightened in 2007 when the national infrastructure of Estonia and Georgia came under attack.