When IT Meets Politics

Improving the Cyber Resilience of London

Philip Virgo
Philip Virgo
Winsafe Ltd

 The last of the National Network of Cyber Resilience Centres to be launched was that for London.  I convene their Advisory Group.

Our objective is to bring players together in support of projects which position the London Cyber Resilience Centre as an umbrella for partnerships to deliver support and services for micro-businesses and sole traders at scale and help address the on-line safety, safeguarding, security and resilience needs of London as a both multi-cultural metropolis and the largest financial services, fintech and cybertech hub outside North Americas.

The LCRC is hosted by the new City University Multi-Disciplinary Centre for Cyber-Security and Society (MOBS). This has partners networked across 60 universities: half UK, half across Europe, Asia, Africa, India, Australasia and the Americas. Those involved already run research and other programmes with the Bank of England, BT, DCMS/DSIT, GCHQ, Google, IBM, Microsoft and the main Children’s charities (cyberbullying, on-line safety, safeguarding etc.). We aim to work together to support the wider objectives of Law enforcement, Home Office, DSIT, Cabinet Office, GCHQ, NCSC, NPSA etc. by hosting relevant research and technology transfer.

The national CRC model currently assumes that the means for meeting the needs of 5 million micro-businesses and sole traders are akin to those for 200,000 small businesses and 40,000 medium sized businesses. There is no statistically robust evidence for this. Current studies (e.g. DSIT Data Breaches surveys) do not contact microbusinesses or sole traders.  There is a critical need to promote research to identify whether their needs are indeed the same.

Meanwhile the advisory group is creating a network of self-sustaining partnerships to draw in the resources necessary to deliver the current national model at scale, while building towards what is really needed. We have tasked six sub-groups to agree succinct statements of objectives, supported by action plans to achieve these, including performance measures, target participants and recruitment strategy, to be under way by mid-September covering the following.

  1. Bringing Small/Micro Business support groups alongside security product and service providers to deliver relevant guidance and support at scale via sustainable channels.
  2. The collation and provision of timely and relevant threat intelligence and alerts to those in a position to take action
  3. The provision of guidance and support for school’s governors and their schools building on the recommendations in Cyber Governors for London’s Schools
  4. Ensuring the needs of the Financial Services, Fintech and Cybertech, including to update the existing work force, are addressed in the London Skills Improvement plans
  5. Building on and joining up existing processes to harness a wide variety of volunteers, assessed for safeguarding as well as competence, to support SMEs,  schools, youth groups, charities and outreach/inclusion programmes.
  6. Emerging Issues: events and topics to bring researchers, entrepreneurs, investors, vendors, potential customers, politicians and advisors together to make things happens.

Please e-mail [email protected] for more details and an invitation to join the London Cyber Resilience Centre and/or the Advisory group.