The UK parliament has launched an inquiry into its cybersecurity defenses, as part of its five year cybersecurity strategy.
Cyberthreats were pinpointed as “one of the four key security challenges” facing the UK in its 2015 National Cybersecurity Review.
The Joint Committee on the National Security Strategy has been tasked with assessing the nation’s cybersecurity defenses and the types of threats it faces.
The committee, made up of MPs and peers, has been allocated a budget of £1.9 billion from 2016 and 2021.
"The internet has changed our daily lives almost beyond recognition from the way we communicate, to the way we trade and the way government provides services to citizens,” said Margaret Beckett MP, chair of the Joint Committee on the National Security Strategy.
“The national security implications of the leap to cyber are a matter of increasing concern.”
She added: “The national security implications of the leap to cyber are a matter of increasing concern.”
In recent years, the UK government has treated the protection of national infrastructure organizations, such as banking and transport, as a matter of paramount importance.
Beckett added: "While the digital revolution has opened up a whole host of opportunities, it has also created new vulnerabilities."
The need for heightened cybersecurity defenses will only increase as people become more reliant on digital solutions for utilities and infrastructure, and the Internet of Things becomes more widespread.
The UK’s National Crime Agency (NCA) has previously outlined its keenness to work more closely with security organizations around the world to tackle the global threat of cybercrime.
Speaking at the CLOUDSEC London 2015 conference, Oliver Gower, head of strategy, partnerships and transformation at the NCA’s National Cyber Crime Unit, emphasized the necessity of a collective strategy from the security world to combat a universal menace.
