News

IT for government and public sector

• March 04, 2024 04 Mar'24

  Amazon lobbyists banned from European Parliament

  Amazon lobbyists have had their access badges to the European Parliament revoked, following allegedly repeated refusals to engage with lawmakers on issues around working conditions and rights

• March 04, 2024 04 Mar'24

  G-Cloud 14 insurance requirements ‘under review’ by CCS after SME supplier backlash

  CCS has confirmed to Computer Weekly the insurance requirements for Lots 1 to 3 of the G-Cloud 14 framework are under review, as SME-focused minister pledges to investigate matter

• March 01, 2024 01 Mar'24

  Scottish government opens Techscaler hub in Silicon Valley

  The Scottish Techscaler programme is piloting its first overseas hub, which will have space for 12 startups wanting to grow their businesses

• March 01, 2024 01 Mar'24

  KC names Post Office staff he believes conspired to pervert the course of justice

  Leading KC names Post Office staff he believes perverted the course of justice when crushing subpostmasters in court

• March 01, 2024 01 Mar'24

  MPs demand Fujitsu be ‘nailed down’ on financial promise to Post Office scandal victims

  Select committee hears that government is talking to Fujitsu about its contribution towards the costs of the Horizon scandal but it is not yet negotiating

• February 29, 2024 29 Feb'24

  Home Office GPS tagging of asylum seekers breaches data protection law

  The Information Commissioner’s Office has issued an enforcement notice against the Home Office after finding its programme to tag asylum seekers with GPS monitors breaches data protection law

• February 29, 2024 29 Feb'24

  DSIT publishes results of public digital identity trust consultation

  Report from Department for Science, Innovation and Technology shows UK public wants government to be accountable and transparent, and views trust and inclusivity as key

• February 29, 2024 29 Feb'24

  Government sets out research plans for 2024

  Department for Science, Innovation and Technology highlights cyber security, artificial intelligence and telecoms as areas where it would like to build evidence and bridge knowledge gaps in current research

• February 29, 2024 29 Feb'24

  Post Office CEO’s claim to be ‘working hard’ on Capture investigation in doubt

  The Post Office hasn’t even contacted Capture Software users brought to its attention, but CEO claimed, under oath, that the organisation has been ‘working hard’ on the cases for five weeks

• February 29, 2024 29 Feb'24

  Police arrested journalists as part of surveillance operation to identify confidential sources

  Three police forces took part in surveillance operations between 2011 and 2018 to identify sources that leaked information to journalists Trevor Birney and Barry McCaffrey, the Investigatory Powers Tribunal hears

• February 28, 2024 28 Feb'24

  New version of ALPHV/BlackCat ransomware hits victims

  An updated version of the ALPHV/BlackCat ransomware has been spotted in the wild amid a series of attacks on American healthcare providers, prompting a new alert from the authorities

• February 28, 2024 28 Feb'24

  75% of third-party breaches target software, IT supply chains

  Data drawn from SecurityScorecard’s telemetry reveals how supply chain breaches are becoming a weapon of choice for threat actors

• February 28, 2024 28 Feb'24

  Users love their cyber teams, but find them frustrating

  Despite strong support for security teams, a good number of ordinary workers see them as obstructive to business goals, and would like to see them operate more transparently

• February 28, 2024 28 Feb'24

  IR35 reforms: PAC concerned HMRC’s ‘tough’ enforcement is harming contractors

  The Public Accounts Committee (PAC) has raised red flags over how HMRC is policing the IR35 rules out of concern its actions might be putting public and private sector organisations off hiring contractors

• February 28, 2024 28 Feb'24

  ‘Pathetic’ Post Office spat detracts attention and fuels ‘disdain’ for authority

  Former Post Office chair’s row with the government and Post Office cannot be allowed to deflect attention away from achieving justice and recompense for former subpostmasters

• February 28, 2024 28 Feb'24

  UC finetunes tech strategy to support digital masterplan

  The University of Canberra is scoping a new project to determine data, integration and multicloud strategies to support its long-term digital roadmap

• February 28, 2024 28 Feb'24

  CCS accused of pricing G-Cloud SMEs out of framework with £20m insurance cover hike

  The Crown Commercial Service’s commitment to helping SMEs win more government cloud deals is being called into question again, following news that it is planning to up the insurance cover required by G-Cloud 14 suppliers by £20m

• February 27, 2024 27 Feb'24

  Black Basta and Bl00dy ransomware gangs exploiting ConnectWise vulns

  More ransomware gangs have been observed exploiting two dangerous vulnerabilities in ConnectWise ScreenConnect software, prompting new warnings for users to get patching

• February 27, 2024 27 Feb'24

  VulnCheck bug listing to help track new threats quicker

  Exploit intelligence firm VulnCheck launches a proprietary Known Exploited Vulnerabilities catalogue in hopes of improving end-user access to intel on emerging threats and reaching those that the likes of CISA do not

• February 27, 2024 27 Feb'24

  Government should face legal deadlines on paying Post Office victims

  The government should face a legal deadline on paying Horizon scandal victims and unfair previous settlements should be reopened, MPs have been told - amid further boardroom controversy at the Post Office

• February 27, 2024 27 Feb'24

  Majority of UK employees ‘willingly gamble’ with security

  Human-centric threats originating from employees continue to damage organisations both financially and reputationally, according to a report

• February 27, 2024 27 Feb'24

  Cozy Bear and other APTs changing tack as cloud adoption increases

  A change in APT tactics has been observed resulting from greater adoption of cloud-based services, according to the NCSC

• February 26, 2024 26 Feb'24

  Government won’t rush to include Post Office Capture convictions in overturning legislation

  The government said it does not yet have the 'right body of evidence' to include users of the Post Office's Capture software in Horizon compensation schemes and legislation to overturn convictions

• February 26, 2024 26 Feb'24

  Birmingham looks into reimplementing troubled Oracle ERP

  City council audit committee meeting shows Birmingham City Council plans to follow Oracle best practices

• February 26, 2024 26 Feb'24

  Post Office scandal roundup: Fourth Estate in full throttle

  January saw mainstream media take hold of the Post Office scandal, and while that first month saw much regurgitation of old news, February saw large media outlets take story forward

• February 26, 2024 26 Feb'24

  Secret court hears claims of police surveillance against journalists

  Journalists Trevor Birney and Barry McCaffrey argue that the use of covert powers by the police to identify their confidential sources represents an attack on press freedom

• February 23, 2024 23 Feb'24

  King Charles strips disgraced Post Office CEO of her CBE

  Disgraced former Post Office CEO, central to the Horizon scandal, has her CBE formally stripped

• February 23, 2024 23 Feb'24

  ConnectWise users see cyber attacks surge, including ransomware

  ConnectWise ScreenConnect users who have yet to patch against a critical vulnerability are now being targeted by a barrage of cyber attacks, including ransomware

• February 23, 2024 23 Feb'24

  Home Office signs tech and data sharing deal with Frontex

  The UK’s deal with the EU border agency is intended to improve operational cooperation, and will expand British authorities’ access to technology and data that can be used to reduce small boat crossings of the English Channel

• February 22, 2024 22 Feb'24

  Law to clear hundreds of wrongfully convicted subpostmasters expected in July

  Law to overturn Post Office convictions based on computer evidence set to be introduced in July following unprecedented legislation

• February 22, 2024 22 Feb'24

  Mid and South Essex sets out plans for shared care record

  The Essex-based integrated care system is developing a shared care record for health and social care, aiming to go live in spring 2024

• February 21, 2024 21 Feb'24

  CVE volumes set to increase 25% this year

  The number of reported Common Vulnerabilities and Exposures is likely to grow significantly in 2024, hitting a new high of almost 35,000, according to Coalition, a cyber insurance specialist

• February 21, 2024 21 Feb'24

  Assange created a ‘grave and immediate risk’, says US government, as it seeks extradition

  Lawyers for the US government hit back at claims that extraditing WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange is politically motivated

• February 21, 2024 21 Feb'24

  Unisys investigating potential involvement in controversial Post Office system

  IT supplier wants to get to the bottom of its role in the distribution of the Post Office’s controversial Capture software, linked to potential wrongful convictions

• February 20, 2024 20 Feb'24

  Birmingham City Council needs a further £45m to fix ‘disastrous’ Oracle system

  Birmingham City Council’s ERP system is failing to deliver an accurate ledger, which means finance staff have spent months manually entering cost centre data

• February 20, 2024 20 Feb'24

  US extradition of Julian Assange is ‘state retaliation’ for exposing war crimes, court hears

  Lawyers argue that the US extradition case against WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange is politically motivated and in is breach of the UK-US extradition treaty

• February 20, 2024 20 Feb'24

  Government agrees law to protect confidential journalistic material from state hacking

  The government will update Investigatory Powers Act to require secret intelligence agencies to seek independent approval before accessing confidential journalistic material obtained by bulk hacking, but journalists remain vulnerable to other bulk ...

• February 19, 2024 19 Feb'24

  UK government launches tech talent campaign

  The Department for Science, Innovation and Technology is encouraging people to sign up to digital skills bootcamps as government-funded research reveals huge demand for entry-level and junior tech talent

• February 19, 2024 19 Feb'24

  Controversial Post Office Capture system was developed in-house

  Second controversial Post Office system was the work of developers in its own IT operation

• February 16, 2024 16 Feb'24

  Poor data and IT hamper cross-government working, PAC report finds

  Report cites inadequate data, poor IT systems and departmental silos as major barriers to cross-government working, and calls on government to do better

• February 16, 2024 16 Feb'24

  Government awards £10m to medtech developers

  The government has awarded £10m to eight technology companies to create innovative medical devices and bring them to market

• February 16, 2024 16 Feb'24

  Post Office IT insider and the software decision that lit the Horizon scandal

  As the Post Office replaces its controversial Horizon software, a former Post Office IT executive describes disastrous mistakes of the past

• February 15, 2024 15 Feb'24

  WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange faces last appeal against ‘political’ extradition

  WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange is seeking leave to appeal against extradition to the US in a case that could have chilling implications for journalists reporting on national security

• February 14, 2024 14 Feb'24

  Dutch Supreme Court approves use of EncroChat evidence

  Defence lawyers plan appeal to European Court of Human Rights after Supreme Court upholds a conviction based on intercepted messages from the EncroChat encrypted phone network

• February 14, 2024 14 Feb'24

  Met Police to scrap and replace ‘racist’ Gangs Violence Matrix

  A database used by the Metropolitan Police to identify and track people linked with gang violence is being decommissioned and replaced. The decision follows a long-running controversy over its discriminatory impacts on young black people, but ...

• February 14, 2024 14 Feb'24

  Microsoft patches two zero-days for Valentine’s Day

  Two security feature bypasses impacting Microsoft SmartScreen are on the February Patch Tuesday docket, among more than 70 issues

• February 14, 2024 14 Feb'24

  Security experts: Investigatory powers plans will delay security updates

  Cyber security experts warn that government proposals to amend the Investigatory Powers Act will limit tech companies’ ability to respond to security threats and could hamper the use of end-to-end encryption

• February 14, 2024 14 Feb'24

  Post Office CEO refused to meet government minister without her lawyer after 2015 Horizon report

  Post Office statements on the Horizon system, whether to journalists or the government, were routinely carefully crafted by lawyers

• February 13, 2024 13 Feb'24

  Hunter-killer malware volumes seen surging

  Latest Picus Security report on malware tactics, techniques and procedures reveals an increasing focus on disabling security defences

• February 13, 2024 13 Feb'24

  DSIT pumps £100m into biotech projects

  The funding will be given to six engineering biology mission hubs, aiming to pioneer new technologies and address global challenges