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UK Government Vows To Sink $2.3 Billion Into New Cybersecurity Plan (arstechnica.com)

Posted by msmash on from the better-security dept.

The UK government has promised to spend nearly $2.3 billion over the next five years to try to tackle the growing problem of cyber attacks in the country. An anonymous reader writes: Recent research suggested that Britain is particularly susceptible to data breaches involving compromised employee account data. Nonetheless, chancellor of the exchequer Philip Hammond claimed on Tuesday that the country is "an acknowledged global leader in cyber security." Number 11's occupant crowed that the previous Tory-led coalition government had chucked 860 million pound at the problem, but Hammond then undermined himself somewhat by adding that "we must now keep up with the scale and pace of the threats we face." Which underlines the fact that the government is playing catch-up in its race against cybercrimes.

12 of 31 comments (clear)

  1. UK Cybersecurity Plan by sinij · · Score: 3, Funny

    Does UK Cybersecurity Plan includes new provisions in the Snooper's Charter to mandate rectally inserted individual monitoring devices? Because if not, it doesn't go far enough in destroying privacy and dignity.

    1. Re:UK Cybersecurity Plan by serviscope_minor · · Score: 1

      Does UK Cybersecurity Plan includes new provisions in the Snooper's Charter to mandate rectally inserted individual monitoring devices?

      Not yet, but with May in charge, it won't be long.

      --
      SJW n. One who posts facts.
    2. Re:UK Cybersecurity Plan by Big+Hairy+Ian · · Score: 1

      @ the rate the pound is falling £2.3 Billion will be enough to buy a bag of chips

      --

      Build a Man a Fire, and He'll Be Warm for a Day. Set a Man on Fire, and He'll Be Warm for the Rest of His Life.

    3. Re:UK Cybersecurity Plan by tomxor · · Score: 1

      Well... May is in power now... Rectal monitoring implants are now mandatory from birth. If you did not receive one at birth then you are a triple plus pirate terrorist criminal monkey and should be extradited to America, uh i mean the ministry of cognitive correctional sciences to be suppressed, uh educated I mean ... you savage you, with your unbackdoored OS and sellotape over your camera, what a monster, think of the children!

  2. History by LQ · · Score: 1

    The UK government has such a great history of wise IT investment that I'm sure this new money will be well spent.

    1. Re:History by ColdWetDog · · Score: 3, Funny

      Well, the title did say 'sink', did it not?

      --
      Faster! Faster! Faster would be better!
    2. Re:History by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      One of the reasons so many of these endeavors go pear-shaped, is that parliament/legislature is populated with lawyers, who make a living out of the belief that reality is relative and malleable by language, so if they say it is so, it will be so. Reality disagrees.

  3. Correct use of the word by JustAnotherOldGuy · · Score: 2

    "UK Government Vows To Sink $2.3 Billion Into New Cybersecurity Plan"

    Yes, and "sink" is probably the exact word that should be used to describe where the money will go.

    Apparently, "flush" doesn't sound as good in a headline.

    --
    Just cruising through this digital world at 33 1/3 rpm...
    1. Re:Correct use of the word by AmiMoJo · · Score: 1

      $2.3bn is barely enough to make a dent in the insecurity efforts of GCHQ. As long as they are making us more vulnerable to attack we will need a lot more than this to stand much chance.

      --
      const int one = 65536; (Silvermoon, Texture.cs)
      SJW, n: "Someone I don't like, and by the way I'm a fuckwit" - AC
    2. Re: Correct use of the word by johanw · · Score: 1

      Girls can do that too, as there are many videos on the internet showing that.

  4. At least it is dollars by OneHundredAndTen · · Score: 1

    For, if it were pounds, in a few months it would allow them to buy more than a few PCs.

  5. Re:Wasn't it meant to be free? by AHuxley · · Score: 1

    Join your local hero battalions, hero-companies and hero-platoons and fight a cyber war?.
    Reminds me of the Pals battalion of WW1 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...
    "specially constituted battalions of the British Army comprising men who had enlisted together in local recruiting drives, with the promise that they would be able to serve alongside their friends, neighbours and colleagues ("pals"), rather than being arbitrarily allocated to battalion"
    Everyone interesting in the UK will just use a VPN.
    The moment a VPN turns over a real ip in a public UK court, a flood of users will move to other VPN's in more legally secure nations.
    All the online informants can do is track UK pictures, comments, slang and jargon. Report it and hope user did not have a VPN.
    The other trick would be to alter their OS to expose the real ip if an OS based VPN. Civilian volunteers help by pushing/offering malware to uncover a weak OS based VPN? It gets the ip, the case goes to court and the method is a secret or gets exposed? Word spreads about the VPN altering method.
    Get a VPN router and secure all networks and every link in and out?
    The VPN's of the world will counter with more router hardware ready with a fall back to prevent a real ip from been exposed.
    The final UK tracking network will look a lot like https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... to track every packet in and out of the UK but with court ready logs.
    The next layer down will be empowered SJW like informants tracking and reporting any UK terms, slang, comments.
    Expect a lot of facial recognition in real time via the volunteers and any camera details in files to be kept.

    Will it work? The smart people will get a router VPN and can only be seen by the GCHQ. Getting that to court will expose methods.
    If the VPN's get exposed in local UK courts, people will just return to real life fun and use the net for safe everyday life. All the digital tracking will be expensive and very useless. Word will spread that the UK internet is unsafe not fun and best to be avoided. The endless flow of interesting information will slow as ever more interesting users will feel they are under watch and alter their online actions. Information collection will then revert to the real world of MI6, MI5 and the police. Nice over time in 9 person teams to watch one interesting person in the real world. The UK will need a lot more in the overtime budget if the net goes dark after collection becomes a risk that alters interesting users internet patterns.

    People do interesting things if they think they are not been watch. Telling the world the UK is watching the net and can take court action is not going to get many results as the interesting people go dark. They don't have to use the net.
    Can the UK track every interesting person in the real world like it did in the 1980's? Whats the interesting person ratio to police/army/contractor teams collecting overtime per car, van, at dedicated CCTV per day? Getting near that East Germany ratio? Got an East German budget to cover that amount of staff?

    --
    Domestic spying is now "Benign Information Gathering"