News

IT for government and public sector

• September 04, 2024 04 Sep'24

  Retailers question using live facial recognition for shoplifting

  Retailers praise benefits of retrospective over live facial recognition in dealing with shoplifting, but stress there are ongoing concerns around the ethical, legal and safety implications of using the technology in stores

• September 04, 2024 04 Sep'24

  Post Office and Fujitsu malevolence and incompetence means huge final taxpayers’ bill

  The human tragedy caused by the Post Office scandal cannot be measured, but the total financial cost will be well beyond the £1bn set aside by the government

• September 03, 2024 03 Sep'24

  Tech secretary pledges to ‘rewire Whitehall’ and plug the digital gap

  Secretary of state for Science, Innovation and Technology, Peter Kyle, promises to drive innovation through the NHS, champion AI safety and ensure government harnesses the power of digital

• September 03, 2024 03 Sep'24

  Transport for London hit by cyber attack

  London’s transport network provider TfL experiences cyber security incident, but reassures customers there is no impact on services

• September 02, 2024 02 Sep'24

  UK and Ukraine digital trade deal comes into force

  The UK eases access to the deep tech startup community in Ukraine through digital-only agreement

• September 02, 2024 02 Sep'24

  Government funds research to tackle extreme weather

  Researchers will use data gathered from monitoring rivers, weather conditions and ground water saturation to improve flood and drought defences

• August 30, 2024 30 Aug'24

  Government renews hunt for UKRI CEO

  Two senior innovation roles are up for grabs as government looks for a CEO to lead UK Research and Innovation, as well as a new executive chair of Innovate UK

• August 29, 2024 29 Aug'24

  Telegram CEO Pavel Durov under formal investigation, released on bail

  European Commission confirms it has powers to place Telegram under ‘direct supervision’ if it meets the threshold for regulation under the Digital Services Act

• August 29, 2024 29 Aug'24

  Iranian APT caught acting as access broker for ransomware crews

  Members of Iran-backed Pioneer Kitten APT appear to be trying to supplement their pay packets by helping Russian-speaking ransomware gangs to access their victims in exchange for a cut of the profits

• August 29, 2024 29 Aug'24

  Met Police deploy LFR in Lewisham without community input

  The Met’s latest live facial recognition deployment in Catford has raised concerns over the lack of community engagement around the police force’s use of the controversial technology

• August 28, 2024 28 Aug'24

  Iranian APT Peach Sandstorm teases new Tickler malware

  Peach Sandstorm, an Iranian state threat actor, has developed a dangerous new malware strain that forms a key element of a rapidly evolving attack sequence

• August 28, 2024 28 Aug'24

  Global cyber spend to rise 15% in 2025, pushed along by AI

  Security spending will increase at pace in 2025, with artificial intelligence, cloud and consultancy services all pushing outlay to new highs, according to Gartner

• August 28, 2024 28 Aug'24

  Cambridge Enterprise saves big with Keepit SaaS backup

  University innovation body avoids hardware spend and saves management time as it switches from tape to cloud-to-cloud backup, instant recovery and decades-long retention from Keepit

• August 28, 2024 28 Aug'24

  Telegram founder Pavel Durov questioned over cyber crime charges

  Billionaire founder of Telegram accused of failing to co-operate with law enforcement requests for lawful interception

• August 28, 2024 28 Aug'24

  Government commits to £4m data and AI package for education

  Plans include a £3m data store for education data, £1m catalyst fund for new AI tools, and a commitment to publish an AI safety framework

• August 22, 2024 22 Aug'24

  New Qilin tactics a ‘bonus multiplier’ for ransomware chaos

  Sophos X-Ops caught the Qilin ransomware gang stealing credentials stored by victims' employees in Google Chrome, heralding further cyber attacks and breaches down the line.

• August 22, 2024 22 Aug'24

  Police Digital Service taps up former biometrics commissioner as interim CEO

  The Police Digital Service has confirmed the appointment of an interim chief executive

• August 22, 2024 22 Aug'24

  DHSC should have dedicated digital records unit, says Tony Blair Institute

  The digital health record unit would drive creation and implementation of electronic patient records to deliver health and care improvements and ensure the NHS is ready for the era of artificial intelligence

• August 21, 2024 21 Aug'24

  Post Office Horizon crash disconnected branches from datacentre

  The Post Office has apologised to subpostmasters affected by a major IT outage, which stopped them from doing business

• August 20, 2024 20 Aug'24

  ICO launches privacy notice tool for SMEs

  ICO tool designed to make it easier for small businesses and sole traders operating online to create bespoke data privacy notices for compliance purposes

• August 20, 2024 20 Aug'24

  Phishing links becoming bigger threat than email attachments

  Phishing techniques are evolving away from malicious email attachments, according to a report

• August 20, 2024 20 Aug'24

  Post Office systems crash hits 'collapsing' Horizon system

  Thousands of subpostmasters were unable to log into the controversial Horizon IT system at the start of business

• August 20, 2024 20 Aug'24

  Helsinki braced for elevated cyber attacks

  The City of Helsinki is increasing its collaboration with cyber security and crime investigators following a major attack on its systems

• August 19, 2024 19 Aug'24

  NHS England plans EPR for prisons and detention centres

  The government is looking to procure an electronic patient record system with the aim of improving health records access for individuals in the justice system

• August 16, 2024 16 Aug'24

  Campaigners criticise Starmer post-riot public surveillance plans

  A UK government programme to expand police facial recognition and information sharing after racist riots is attracting criticism from campaigners for exploiting the far-right unrest to generally crack down on protest and increase surveillance

• August 14, 2024 14 Aug'24

  August Patch Tuesday proves busy with six zero-days to fix

  Microsoft patches six actively exploited zero-days among over 100 issues during its regular monthly update

• August 14, 2024 14 Aug'24

  Newcastle City Council swaps out Oracle Java for Azul

  Changes to Oracle’s Java licensing meant the council no longer received free security patches

• August 14, 2024 14 Aug'24

  Automated police tech contributes to UK structural racism problem

  Civil society groups say automated policing technologies are helping to fuel the disparities that people of colour face across the criminal justice sector, as part of wider warning about the UK’s lack of progress in dealing with systemic racism

• August 14, 2024 14 Aug'24

  IR35 public sector reforms: HS2 finalises £6.2m settlement with HMRC over compliance failings

  After setting aside over £10m to cover its IR35 compliance liabilities, HS2 accounts confirm the organisation reached a final settlement with HMRC totalling £6.2m

• August 13, 2024 13 Aug'24

  NIST debuts three quantum-safe encryption algorithms

  NIST has launched the first three quantum-resistant encryption algorithms, and as the threat of quantum-enabled cyber attacks grows greater, organisations are encouraged to adopt them as soon as they can

• August 12, 2024 12 Aug'24

  Social care must ensure IT systems comply with data standards

  As social care is moving towards meeting its target of 80% of providers having digital records, the Department for Health and Social Care calls on them to ensure the digital systems meet national standards

• August 08, 2024 08 Aug'24

  Royal ransomware crew puts on a BlackSuit in rebrand

  The Royal ransomware gang is back, with a new name and refreshed capabilities, including an apparently unique ‘partial encryption’ gambit, according to CISA

• August 08, 2024 08 Aug'24

  US lawmakers seek to brand ransomware gangs as terrorists

  Proposals from legislators in Washington DC could shake up the global ransomware ecosystem and give law enforcement sweeping new powers

• August 06, 2024 06 Aug'24

  Advanced faces fine over LockBit attack that crippled NHS 111

  Advanced Software faces a multimillion pound fine for a series of failings which directly led to a 2022 LockBit ransomware attack that disrupted NHS and social care services across the UK

• August 06, 2024 06 Aug'24

  2024 seeing more CVEs than ever before, but few are weaponised

  The number of disclosed CVEs soared by 30% in the first seven-and-a-half months of the year, but a tiny fraction of these have been exploited by threat actors, a reminder of the importance of focused security strategies

• August 06, 2024 06 Aug'24

  IR35 public sector reforms: Chancellor urged to review departmental costs generated by blanket bans

  Chancellor Rachel Reeves urged to review ‘non-essential’ departmental spend since the introduction of IR35 reforms in April 2017 as part of her push to close £22bn public spending gap inherited from the Conservatives

• August 05, 2024 05 Aug'24

  Chinese cyber attack sparks alert over six-year-old MS vuln

  After a proof-of-concept for a six-year-old Microsoft vulnerability emerged in a Chinese APT attack chain, defenders should be on the look-out for exploitation of CVE-2018-0824

• August 05, 2024 05 Aug'24

  World’s largest companies at near-universal risk of supply chain breach

  Data from SecurityScorecard once again focuses on the interconnected nature of business supply chains and the risk posed to operational resilience by unexpected IT problems and cyber threats

• August 05, 2024 05 Aug'24

  Russia’s luxury car phish continues to prove effective

  Government organisations and other bodies operating in Ukraine continue to be targeted by a relatively unsophisticated phishing campaign that has proven so effective for Russia’s cyber spooks that there are now multiple agencies involved

• August 05, 2024 05 Aug'24

  Post Office scandal: Phases 5 and 6 had islands of conscientiousness in great depths of neglect

  Computer Weekly rounds up the latest phase of the Post Office Horizon scandal public inquiry after a marathon 16 weeks of questions

• August 02, 2024 02 Aug'24

  Labour axes £1.3bn AI funding promised by the Conservatives

  Government scraps £1.3bn worth of AI and tech programmes launched by the Conservatives, but says it is committed to building technology infrastructure in the UK through its AI Opportunities Action Plan

• August 01, 2024 01 Aug'24

  Police hunt scammers after takedown of Russian Coms fraud platform

  The National Crime Agency has arrested four people after taking down a phone number spoofing platform used by criminals to defraud hundreds of thousands of people in the UK with more arrests to follow

• August 01, 2024 01 Aug'24

  Scottish government to roll out digital evidence sharing

  Following a controversial pilot scheme, Scotland is investing £33m in deploying digital evidence sharing technology nationally

• August 01, 2024 01 Aug'24

  Community care neglected in national digital transformation efforts

  Digital technologies could help the government’s ambition of delivering care at home for longer, but community services suffer from a lack of basic technologies and access to funding, according to the King’s Fund

• July 31, 2024 31 Jul'24

  Police Digital Service confirms resignation of second director in two weeks

  Companies House filing states the Police Digital Service has said goodbye to non-executive director Allan Fairley, with a representative from the company confirming his departure is for ‘conflict of interest’ reasons

• July 31, 2024 31 Jul'24

  Mayor launches London Privacy Register for smart city information

  To increase transparency around and trust in London’s smart city technology deployments, the London Privacy Register aims to provide the public with more information about the systems they encounter in their day-to-day lives

• July 30, 2024 30 Jul'24

  How India is driving road safety with technology

  Traffic departments, law enforcers and new-tech players are betting on technology tools such as AI-powered drones and mobile apps to improve road safety across India

• July 30, 2024 30 Jul'24

  Basic failures led to hack of Electoral Commission data on 40 million people

  UK government identifies Chinese state-linked hackers as likely to have been behind attack on the Electoral Commission

• July 30, 2024 30 Jul'24

  Core British Library services to return for new academic year

  The British Library’s recovery from a devastating ransomware attack that laid waste to its IT systems continues - with hopes that some of its most popular services will be running again in September

• July 30, 2024 30 Jul'24

  GP digital tools could cause patients harm, says report

  Investigation by the Health Services Safety Investigations Body finds some online tools used in general practices could cause risk to patient safety and impact GP workload