News

IT for government and public sector

• September 01, 2022 01 Sep'22

  Local authorities experience 10,000 attempted cyber attacks every day

  Local authorities across the UK face a daily deluge of cyber incidents, with phishing and DDoS attacks the most prevalent, according to an insurance broker

• September 01, 2022 01 Sep'22

  Google workers oppose cloud contract with Israeli government

  Google workers and Palestinian rights activists call on company to divest from involvement in cloud and artificial intelligence contract with Israeli government and military, following allegations the tech giant has retaliated against an employee ...

• August 31, 2022 31 Aug'22

  Regional tech hub leaders want more support with levelling-up from next prime minister

  Several senior leaders from the regional-focused UK Tech Cluster Group have shared their views on what they think the next prime minister should do to ensure tech funding is distributed more evenly across the UK

• August 31, 2022 31 Aug'22

  Norway has NOK200m plan to bolster cyber defences

  Norway is investing heavily in its cyber defences amid heightened threat from Russia

• August 31, 2022 31 Aug'22

  NHS staff fall further behind amid ransomware attack

  While some NHS bodies are now recovering their services after the ransomware attack on a crucial software supplier, others are still being forced to rely on pen and paper, and some will be waiting months to recover

• August 30, 2022 30 Aug'22

  IAM house Okta confirms 0ktapus/Scatter Swine attack

  Following last week’s disclosureby Group-IB researchers of a major phishing campaign, Okta has warned its customers to be on their guard

• August 30, 2022 30 Aug'22

  One Login digital identity project makes headway

  Government services are lining up to work with the GDS on its One Login digital identity system, according to its director of digital identity, Natalie Jones

• August 25, 2022 25 Aug'22

  Adaptive RedAlert, Monster ransomwares go cross-platform

  Kaspersky researchers have shared new intelligence on two emergent cyber criminal groups that have adapted their ransomwares to target different operating systems at the same time

• August 25, 2022 25 Aug'22

  Security pros fret about stress and promotion over cyber attacks

  CIISec’s annual report on the state of the security profession reveals some home truths for security leaders

• August 25, 2022 25 Aug'22

  LockBit 3.0 cements dominance of ransomware ecosystem

  Ransomware attacks were up 47% in July compared with the previous month, according to the latest threat data from NCC Group, with the LockBit family largely to blame

• August 24, 2022 24 Aug'22

  Most CISOs think they’ve been attacked by a nation state

  Most organisations have made changes to their cyber strategies and policies following Russia’s invasion, and almost two-thirds suspect they have been directly targeted or impacted by a nation-state cyber attack

• August 23, 2022 23 Aug'22

  Home Office announces Scale-up visa for fast-growth firms

  Scale-up visa launched to help high-growth businesses employ talent from overseas, but sponsorship requirements could undermine effectiveness

• August 23, 2022 23 Aug'22

  Farming tech projects get £16.5m in government funding

  Projects receiving funding through latest round of farming innovation programme include tech to improve fruit farming and the use of artificial intelligence to improve pigs’ welfare

• August 22, 2022 22 Aug'22

  Google Cloud and Singapore government team up on AI

  Singapore’s National AI office will tap Google Cloud’s expertise in artificial intelligence to build artificial intelligence applications and train public sector officers on AI

• August 22, 2022 22 Aug'22

  Kaspersky threat data added to Microsoft Sentinel service

  Microsoft and Kaspersky have agreed a collaboration to integrate Kaspersky’s threat data feeds into Microsoft’s cloud-native SIEM/SOAR service

• August 22, 2022 22 Aug'22

  Lloyd’s to end insurance coverage for state cyber attacks

  Lloyd’s of London has instructed its members to exclude nation state cyber attacks from insurance policies beginning in 2023, saying they pose unacceptable levels of risk

• August 19, 2022 19 Aug'22

  Cozy Bear targets MS 365 environments with new tactics

  Cozy Bear, or APT29, is trying out new tricks as it seeks access to its targets’ Microsoft 365 environments

• August 18, 2022 18 Aug'22

  LexisNexis sued by immigration advocates over data practices

  Four immigration advocacy groups launch lawsuit in Illinois alleging data broker’s collection, aggregation and sale of people’s personal data, including non-public information, to corporations and government bodies

• August 18, 2022 18 Aug'22

  Growing MFA use spurs ‘pass-the-cookie’ attacks

  The exploitation of stolen session cookies by cyber criminals is once again back on the agenda, thanks to the growing popularity of multifactor authentication tools

• August 18, 2022 18 Aug'22

  It takes a breach to force boards to take notice of cyber, says UK government

  Too often, it takes a major incident for business leadership to pay attention to cyber issues, according to a government-commissioned study of victims

• August 18, 2022 18 Aug'22

  GPS tagging of migrants breaches UK data protection law, says Privacy International complaint

  Privacy group files complaints with Information Commissioner’s Office and Forensic Science Regulator over Home Office’s GPS monitoring of migrants

• August 16, 2022 16 Aug'22

  Cyber security accelerator launches in Greater Manchester

  Accelerator will add to Manchester’s growing cyber security ecosystem, which already includes several tech unicorns, arms companies and the offices of GCHQ

• August 16, 2022 16 Aug'22

  Why organisations need to harmonise their CIO and CISO roles

  Unless properly managed, conflicting responsibilities between the chief information officer and the chief information security officer can cause project delays and budget overruns, says Netskope’s Mike Anderson

• August 16, 2022 16 Aug'22

  DWP looks to hire new CDIO

  Department is on the hunt for a chief digital and information officer to lead on its digital agenda, offering up to £200,000 pa for the role

• August 15, 2022 15 Aug'22

  Lawyers and journalists sue CIA and Mike Pompeo over Assange surveillance claims

  CIA and its former director sued over allegations that they authorised unlawful spying on US citizens when they visited WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange at the Ecuadorian Embassy in London

• August 15, 2022 15 Aug'22

  Royal Mint turns to Circular Computing for remanufactured Lenovo laptops

  BSI Kitemark for laptops supplied by Circular Computing intended to certify remanufactured products that are ‘as good as’ brand new devices

• August 12, 2022 12 Aug'22

  UK Amazon workers stage series of wildcat strikes over pay offers

  Amazon warehouse workers across the UK have organised a series of spontaneous strike actions after the e-commerce giant’s management offered them pay rises between 35p and 50p

• August 12, 2022 12 Aug'22

  Online Safety Bill ‘not fit for purpose’, say tech experts

  IT specialists lack confidence that legislation compelling tech firms to tackle online harms will work as intended, with only a small minority believing ‘harmful but legal’ content can be effectively and proportionately policed by internet platforms

• August 10, 2022 10 Aug'22

  Increase in UK startups scaling to exit, but half still struggle

  Despite more startups scaling to the point of exit than ever before, half are still stuck in low growth stages – particularly those working with emerging technologies

• August 10, 2022 10 Aug'22

  Microsoft fixes two-year-old MSDT vulnerability in August update

  August’s Patch Tuesday drop fixes more than 120 CVEs, including another MSDT RCE zero-day that is being actively exploited.

• August 10, 2022 10 Aug'22

  ‘Coopetition’ a growing trend among ransomware gangs

  Sophos shares data from its new X-Ops unit at Black Hat in Las Vegas, revealing a growing number of ransomware victims being attacked by multiple gangs at the same time

• August 10, 2022 10 Aug'22

  UK to surveil convicted migrants with facial recognition

  A Home Office scheme to biometrically scan the faces of convicted migrants who have already carried out punishments has come under fire from privacy and human rights groups for being discriminatory

• August 09, 2022 09 Aug'22

  HS2 sets aside £9.5m to cover cost of IR35 non-compliance

  HS2 has become the latest public sector entity to have fallen foul of the IR35 rules, with its accounts confirming that it is anticipating a tax bill of £9.5m for failing to assess the status of contractors provided to it by a third party

• August 05, 2022 05 Aug'22

  NAO guide for senior government leaders flags barriers to better data use

  A National Audit Office guide for government chiefs on improving data use points to difficulties in achieving data sharing benefits and laments variability in cross-government data quality

• August 05, 2022 05 Aug'22

  CIO interview: Stephen Booth, CIO, Coventry University

  After more than 20 years at the university, the CIO is still taking on new responsibilities – including his team becoming a commercial entity and acquiring its own software

• August 05, 2022 05 Aug'22

  Reliance on PSN may have exacerbated cyber attack impact

  As it seeks a new supplier to reinvigorate the migration away from the Public Services Network, the Cabinet Office says relying on the legacy network may be putting public sector bodies at heightened risk in cyber attacks

• August 04, 2022 04 Aug'22

  SBRC to administer NCSC training across Scotland

  The Scottish Business Resilience Centre has been awarded a £500,000 contract to extend cyber resilience training across more than 250 at-risk organisations

• August 04, 2022 04 Aug'22

  Financial services regulator opens digital delivery centre in Leeds

  The Financial Conduct Authority is increasing the number of tech experts in its workforce through a new digital delivery centre in Leeds

• August 04, 2022 04 Aug'22

  Spyware activity particularly impactful in July

  After a quiet June, vulnerability exploitation ramped up in July, with intrusions linked to spyware seeing unusually high volumes of activity, according to a report

• August 04, 2022 04 Aug'22

  Financial Ombudsman Service mining for gold in cloud HR and finance

  The Financial Ombudsman Service is reaping the benefits of the cloud-based human resources and finance system it implemented last year

• August 03, 2022 03 Aug'22

  New EU due diligence law needs amending to stop tech sector abuse

  European corporate due diligence directive seeking to transform how companies approach their human rights and environmental risk is welcome, but without further changes, it will fail to effectively curb tech firms’ harmful practices, claims ...

• August 02, 2022 02 Aug'22

  UK safety tech sector sees strong revenue and employment growth

  Safety tech is now one of the fastest-growing sectors in the UK tech industry, with jumps in revenue, investment and employment

• August 01, 2022 01 Aug'22

  Estonia is building AI Gov Stack

  Data scientists in Baltic nation are creating a repository of software code that provides building blocks for digital services

• July 29, 2022 29 Jul'22

  IPA revises review of HMRC’s £300m datacentre migration

  Infrastructure and Project Authority’s annual report ranks HMRC’s £300m datacentre migration as “unachievable”, but – ahead of publication – it appears the organisation has had a change of heart

• July 28, 2022 28 Jul'22

  Home Office selects CGI as strategic delivery partner

  IT services supplier will act as strategic delivery partner for the Home Office’s plans to modernise and join up UK law enforcement’s digital capabilities

• July 28, 2022 28 Jul'22

  Cyber criminals pivot away from macros as Microsoft changes bite

  As Microsoft resumes blocking macros by default in its Office application suite, reversing a temporary reversal, analysis from Proofpoint suggests the action has had a remarkable effect

• July 28, 2022 28 Jul'22

  Teams in Grenoble work on 6G breakthrough technology

  Even as 5G networks are being rolled out, new requirements are driving scientists, and engineers in Europe are back to the lab to start developing 6G

• July 28, 2022 28 Jul'22

  The verdict is Pure as Scottish prosecutor upgrades high-end storage

  Scotland’s prosecution service saw disk drives in the dock every week with EMC legacy storage. Now it’s got Pure all-flash and has turned over an (Evergreen) new leaf

• July 27, 2022 27 Jul'22

  Government slammed for slow response to IR35-related consultation on zero-rights employees

  The government has taken four years to publish its response to a three-month consultation on whether employment status and tax laws should be more closely aligned, and concluded that now is not the right time to make any changes

• July 27, 2022 27 Jul'22

  Consumers left out of pocket as security costs soar

  As the average cost of a security incident reaches an all-time high of nearly $4.5m, an IBM Security study reveals how these costs are being passed on to ordinary people