IT for retail and logistics

Co-op signs TCS deal for cloud-first push

The Co-operative Group has contracted IT service provider Tata Consultancy Services to support its move to a cloud-first IT environment Continue Reading

By

• Karl Flinders, Chief reporter and senior editor EMEA

Unisys investigating potential involvement in controversial Post Office system

IT supplier wants to get to the bottom of its role in the distribution of the Post Office’s controversial Capture software, linked to potential wrongful convictions Continue Reading

By

• Karl Flinders, Chief reporter and senior editor EMEA

Controversial Post Office Capture system was developed in-house

Second controversial Post Office system was the work of developers in its own IT operation Continue Reading

By

• Karl Flinders, Chief reporter and senior editor EMEA

Post Office IT insider and the software decision that lit the Horizon scandal

As the Post Office replaces its controversial Horizon software, a former Post Office IT executive describes disastrous mistakes of the past Continue Reading

By

• Karl Flinders, Chief reporter and senior editor EMEA

Microsoft patches two zero-days for Valentine’s Day

Two security feature bypasses impacting Microsoft SmartScreen are on the February Patch Tuesday docket, among more than 70 issues Continue Reading

By

• Alex Scroxton, Security Editor

Post Office CEO refused to meet government minister without her lawyer after 2015 Horizon report

Post Office statements on the Horizon system, whether to journalists or the government, were routinely carefully crafted by lawyers Continue Reading

By

• Karl Flinders, Chief reporter and senior editor EMEA

Hunter-killer malware volumes seen surging

Latest Picus Security report on malware tactics, techniques and procedures reveals an increasing focus on disabling security defences Continue Reading

By

• Alex Scroxton, Security Editor

More than 1,000 subpostmasters could have used second faulty Post Office system

More than 1,000 subpostmasters could have used a previous faulty computer system in their branches as more people come forward with information following Post Office scandal TV drama Continue Reading

By

• Karl Flinders, Chief reporter and senior editor EMEA

Security Think Tank: The phishing forecast for 2024

Egress' Jack Chapman and James Dyer explore how phishing attacks are set to grow in their scope and sophistication this year, with generative AI playing a big role Continue Reading

By

• Jack Chapman and James Dyer

UK’s McPartland Cyber Review to probe trust in technology

The UK government has launched a cyber security review that will investigate how best to give businesses the confidence they need to use new technologies Continue Reading

By

• Alex Scroxton, Security Editor

Post Office scandal: Phase four’s rogues’ gallery

Phase four of the public inquiry into the Post Office Horizon IT scandal revealed ‘a parade of liars, bullies, amnesiacs and arrogant individuals’ that made up the teams investigating and prosecuting subpostmasters Continue Reading

By

• Karl Flinders, Chief reporter and senior editor EMEA

‘People are now listening,' Post Office inquiry told as latest phase ends

The latest phase of the public inquiry into the widest miscarriage of justice in modern UK history – the Post Office Horizon IT scandal – closes with a bang Continue Reading

By

• Karl Flinders, Chief reporter and senior editor EMEA

Crew Clothing head of IT: ‘The projects don’t stop’

Crew Clothing parted ways with its senior leadership team in 2023, but there is a clear roadmap in place for technology transformation – and it doesn’t involve an ERP system Continue Reading

By

• Ben Sillitoe

Government ‘dragging it out’ by refusing to share knowledge of Post Office trial ‘delaying tactic’

Subpostmasters will have to wait to find out if the government knew of the Post Office’s plan to derail group litigation order, by trying to push managing judge out Continue Reading

By

• Karl Flinders, Chief reporter and senior editor EMEA

Retail’s Big Show: Reporting from the retail technology front line

What themes will we be seeing in the retail tech space over the next year according to the 2024 National Retail Federation’s Big Show? Continue Reading

By

• Glynn Davis

Pre-Horizon users contacting lawyers as more Post Office IT horror stories emerge

Lawyer says there is no reason to believe the Post Office treated unexplained shortfalls on systems prior to Horizon any differently to the way it dealt with unexplained Horizon shortfalls Continue Reading

By

• Karl Flinders, Chief reporter and senior editor EMEA

MP demands answers from government minister over second faulty Post Office IT system

Kevan Jones MP highlighted evidence of injustices caused by a computer system used in Post Office branches prior to the introduction of the controversial Horizon system. Continue Reading

By

• Karl Flinders, Chief reporter and senior editor EMEA

Akira ransomware gang claims Lush cyber attack

The Akira ransomware gang claims to have stolen over 100GB of data from cosmetics manufacturer and retailer Lush Continue Reading

By

• Alex Scroxton, Security Editor

Lawyers carry on Post Office appeals amid uncertainty over government plan to overturn en masse

Lawyers supporting former subpostmasters said they will continue appealing convictions as normal despite government plan to exonerate hundreds in one go Continue Reading

By

• Karl Flinders, Chief reporter and senior editor EMEA

Expert IT witness outsmarted an ‘aggressive’ Post Office to get to truth after inspection ‘madness’

The Post Office’s attempts to protect the Horizon system are well known, in light of the public inquiry and a recent TV drama, but Computer Weekly can reveal how an IT expert was treated during his investigation of Horizon Continue Reading

By

• Karl Flinders, Chief reporter and senior editor EMEA

Bugcrowd sees surge in vulnerability submissions, led by public sector

Crowdsourced vulnerability disclosure and bug bounty platform Bugcrowd says it saw a 151% uptick in submissions related to government and public sector organisations in 2023 Continue Reading

By

• Alex Scroxton, Security Editor

WebKit vulnerability sparks Apple’s first major security update of 2024

A zero-day in the open source WebKit browser engine that powers Safari has sparked Apple’s first major patch roll-out of the new year Continue Reading

By

• Alex Scroxton, Security Editor

AI will heighten global ransomware threat, says NCSC

The benefits of artificial intelligence to cyber criminals being well-known, the NCSC now assesses it’s likely AI will soon be widely used to enhance ransomware attacks Continue Reading

By

• Alex Scroxton, Security Editor

Committee chair asks minister to back ‘Mr Bates clause’ in Post Office compensation legislation

Select committee chair wants guarantees on financial redress for subpostmasters that suffered in the Horizon scandal Continue Reading

By

• Karl Flinders, Chief reporter and senior editor EMEA

Treat cyber risk like financial or legal issue, says UK government

UK government and NCSC launch proposed code of practice on cyber security governance to help directors and business leaders toughen their defences Continue Reading

By

• Alex Scroxton, Security Editor

Leak of 26 billion records may prove to be ‘mother of all breaches’

The discovery of a dataset comprising 26 billion stolen records may prove to be record-breaking in both its size and the danger it poses to ordinary people Continue Reading

By

• Alex Scroxton, Security Editor

Fujitsu agrees to support former subpostmasters’ families beyond financial redress

Fujitsu will meet with victims of the Post Office scandal and their representatives to discuss what the IT giant can do for them beyond financial redress Continue Reading

By

• Karl Flinders, Chief reporter and senior editor EMEA

Urgent question asks which ministers knew of Post Office’s shocking plan to remove judge

Labour peer uses urgent question to uncover who, if anyone, in government was aware of the Post Office’s attempts to remove judge as it became clear it was losing Continue Reading

By

• Karl Flinders, Chief reporter and senior editor EMEA

Stellar Lifestyle opens high-tech retail space

The Hive 2.0 retail space in Esplanade Xchange uses AI and robots to enable self-checkout, prepare and serve beverages, and deliver items to offices in a nearby building Continue Reading

By

• Aaron Tan, TechTarget

Unilever provides recipe support to blind and partially sighted shoppers

Accessible QR codes and an app from Be My Eyes link shoppers direct to Unilever customer support Continue Reading

By

• Cliff Saran, Managing Editor

Fujitsu boss admits to missed opportunities to prevent miscarriages of justice

Concerns of an expert witness in subpostmaster trials were ignored by Fujitsu Continue Reading

By

• Karl Flinders, Chief reporter and senior editor EMEA

Fujitsu boss describes Post Office behaviour as 'shameful and appalling'

The UK head of Fujitsu said he does not know why the Post Office did not reveal information about Horizon software errors to defendants during prosecutions Continue Reading

By

• Karl Flinders, Chief reporter and senior editor EMEA

More than 900 subpostmaster convictions wouldn’t have happened without Post Office-backed law change

IT expert says it cannot be the case that computer evidence is treated as accurate in court, without investigation into surrounding circumstances Continue Reading

By

• Karl Flinders, Chief reporter and senior editor EMEA

Biometric revolution in IAM: The future of authentication

The IAM landscape is experiencing profound change thanks to the advent of biometrics. Learn about the latest advantages and key benefits of biometrics in identity Continue Reading

By

• Isla Sibanda

Paula Vennells fails to practice what she preaches in Post Office scandal

Reverend Richard Coles tells Computer Weekly how a recent ITV drama ‘moved and enraged’ a public that had missed the unfolding of the biggest miscarriage of justice in modern history, in front of their noses Continue Reading

By

• Reverend Richard Coles

Fujitsu ‘morally obliged’ to contribute to subpostmaster financial redress amid ‘insane’ delays

Fujitsu has apologised for its role on the Post Office scandal and said it is ‘morally obliged’ to contribute to the financial redress of victims Continue Reading

By

• Karl Flinders, Chief reporter and senior editor EMEA

The human toll of ransomware: how IT pros suffer during incidents

Any ransomware attack causes significant challenges for a business or organisation going through such incident. But ransomware attacks also have tremendous impact on the staff – especially IT teams – working on mitigating the attack’s effect Continue Reading

By

• Pia Hüsch, Jamie MacColl and Gareth Mott

Hundreds of subpostmasters to have their convictions quashed in blanket exoneration

Government will introduce legislation to exonerate hundreds of subpostmasters as a group. Continue Reading

All eyes are on the Post Office scandal – at last

In this week’s Computer Weekly, 15 years since we first revealed the plight of subpostmasters, and four years since their High Court victory, the UK public and government are getting behind the victims, thanks to a TV dramatisation of the scandal. We look at government plans to quash convictions, and analyse the role of Horizon IT supplier Fujitsu in how the Post Office scandal developed. Read the issue now. Continue Reading

Cosmetics retailer Lush dealing with mystery cyber incident

Cosmetics retailer Lush confirms it’s investigating a cyber attack of an undisclosed nature, but key public-facing systems appear to be unaffected Continue Reading

By

• Alex Scroxton, Security Editor

Post Office scandal inquiry hits mainstream after dramatic start to year

Long-running statutory public inquiry restarts with hugely increased interest following ITV’s dramatisation of the two decades-long scandal Continue Reading

By

• Karl Flinders, Chief reporter and senior editor EMEA

Cisco fixes high-impact flaw in unified comms platform

Cisco unified comms customers are urged to patch a critical vulnerability in Unity Connection, a messaging and voicemail product Continue Reading

By

• Alex Scroxton, Security Editor

Hundreds of subpostmasters to have convictions quashed in blanket exoneration

The government has chosen to introduce legislation that will enable it to exonerate hundreds of subpostmasters as a group Continue Reading

By

• Karl Flinders, Chief reporter and senior editor EMEA

Windows Kerberos, Hyper-V vulns among January Patch Tuesday bugs

Microsoft starts 2024 right with another slimline Patch Tuesday drop, but there are some critical vulns to be alert to, including a number of man-in-the-middle attack vectors Continue Reading

By

• Alex Scroxton, Security Editor

Babuk Tortilla ransomware decryptor made available

A joint effort between Cisco Talos, Avast and the Dutch police will bring relief to many victims of a variant of the Babuk ransomware known as Tortilla Continue Reading

By

• Alex Scroxton, Security Editor

Former Post Office CEO hands back CBE amid public backlash

Former Post Office CEO hands back her CBE after public backlash following dramatisation of her role in Post Office Horizon scandal Continue Reading

By

• Karl Flinders, Chief reporter and senior editor EMEA

‘Hero’ subpostmaster accuses government of diversion tactics through ‘weaselly’ statistics

Campaigning subpostmaster calls out government’s use of ‘weaselly’ statistics to hide its slow progress Continue Reading

By

• Karl Flinders, Chief reporter and senior editor EMEA

Fujitsu gets stay of execution as MPs support exoneration of wrongfully convicted subpostmasters

Fujitsu will have to wait until the end of the Post Office Horizon scandal public inquiry to hear how MPs will punish it Continue Reading

By

• Karl Flinders, Chief reporter and senior editor EMEA

Trauma and fear means victims of the Post Office scandal are suffering in silence

Just like victims of child abuse, it is likely that issues of trauma, fear, feelings of shame and a complete loss of trust in authority are some of the powerful inhibitors preventing victims of the Post Office scandal from coming forward Continue Reading

By

• David Enright

Post Office scandal furore is moment to change digital evidence rules

The current rules around digital evidence are partly to blame for the widest miscarriage of justice in UK history Continue Reading

By

• Karl Flinders, Chief reporter and senior editor EMEA

Metropolitan Police launches second criminal investigation in Post Office scandal

New investigation will examine potential crimes by the Post Office in its recovery of money from subpostmasters accused of theft and false accounting Continue Reading

By

• Karl Flinders, Chief reporter and senior editor EMEA

Celona and Palo Alto partner to enhance private 5G network security

Wireless services specialist Celona and security firm Palo Alto Networks are coming together to enhance device protection for organisations operating private mobile networks Continue Reading

By

• Alex Scroxton, Security Editor

Artificial intelligence to the front in Sweden’s National Technology Strategy

Sweden focuses in on artificial intelligence in its latest far-reaching national IT strategy Continue Reading

By

• Gerard O'Dwyer

Decoding zero trust in endpoint security: A practical guide for CISOs

The exponential increase in endpoints has vastly expanded the average organisation’s attack surface – address this by applying zero-trust best practice to endpoints Continue Reading

By

• Isla Sibanda

Top 10 retail technology stories of 2023

Computer Weekly looks at what 2023 had in store for the retail industry – a year of financial uncertainty and increasing cost of living has made consumers ever more demanding, so how are retailers using tech to cope? Continue Reading

By

• Clare McDonald, Business Editor

Top 10 cyber crime stories of 2023

Ransomware gangs dominated the cyber criminal underworld in 2023, a year that will prove notable for significant evolutionary trends in their tactics Continue Reading

By

• Alex Scroxton, Security Editor

Post Office gets government handout as Horizon replacement costs increase ‘significantly’

The increasing costs associated with replacing the Post Office’s controversial IT system have forced the government to hand it over £100m extra Continue Reading

By

• Karl Flinders, Chief reporter and senior editor EMEA

Beyond the office walls: Safeguarding remote workers from attack

Remote working has enabled people to work from almost anywhere but has piled pressure on cyber pros. Three years after Covid, how are best practices evolving and what can we expect going forward? Continue Reading

By

• Paul Lewis, Nominet

Zero-trust principles: Your gateway to securing remote workers

Remote working has enabled people to work from almost anywhere but has piled pressure on cyber pros. Three years after Covid, how are best practices evolving and what can we expect going forward? Continue Reading

By

• Michael Healey, Turnkey Consulting

Evolving best practice: What next for securing remote work?

Remote working has enabled people to work from almost anywhere but has piled pressure on cyber pros. Three years after Covid, how are best practices evolving and what can we expect going forward? Continue Reading

By

• Scott Burman

'No hiding place' for those responsible for Post Office Horizon scandal

MPs want individuals to be held to account for their roles in causing the Post Office Horizon scandal, which destroyed thousands of lives Continue Reading

By

• Karl Flinders, Chief reporter and senior editor EMEA

ALPHV/BlackCat operation down, but maybe not out

Multinational law enforcement has targeted the operations of the notorious ALPHV/BlackCat cyber extortion gang, but the group’s members appear to remain defiant Continue Reading

By

• Alex Scroxton, Security Editor

Government reveals its own slow progress in compensating Post Office scandal victims

Few of the subpostmasters who unearthed the widest miscarriage of justice in UK history have been compensated so far, four years after their court victory Continue Reading

By

• Karl Flinders, Chief reporter and senior editor EMEA

Security Think Tank: Testing to improve remote worker security

Remote working has enabled people to work from almost anywhere but has piled pressure on cyber pros. Three years after Covid, how are best practices evolving and what can we expect going forward? Continue Reading

By

• Rowland Johnson

Security Think Tank: Anytime, anywhere access is achievable

Remote working has enabled people to work from almost anywhere but has piled pressure on cyber pros. Three years after Covid, how are best practices evolving and what can we expect going forward? Continue Reading

By

• Tim Holman, 2-sec

Government advised to overturn all Post Office scandal convictions

An independent board set up to advise the government on compensation for innocent subpostmasters has recommended that all the Post Office scandal convictions are ‘unsafe’ and should be overturned Continue Reading

By

• Bryan Glick, Editor in chief

Current Post Office executive in denial of Horizon cover-up

Executives at the Post Office today are still in denial of the part they played in destroying the lives of thousands of people Continue Reading

By

• Karl Flinders, Chief reporter and senior editor EMEA

Microsoft’s Christmas present for cyber teams: no zero-days

Barely 30 vulnerabilities, and no zero-days, have been fixed in the final Patch Tuesday drop of 2023 Continue Reading

By

• Alex Scroxton, Security Editor

Critical UK infrastructure a ‘hostage of fortune’ to ransomware

A lack of ransomware planning and preparedness at the highest levels of government is leaving UK operators or critical national infrastructure dangerously exposed, according to a Joint Committee report Continue Reading

By

• Alex Scroxton, Security Editor

Former Post Office investigator called subpostmaster campaigners ‘crooks’

Former Post Office investigator labelled subpostmasters attempting to clear their names as ‘crooks’ Continue Reading

By

• Karl Flinders, Chief reporter and senior editor EMEA

Executive interview: Handling vanilla S/4Hana change management

We speak to the transformation lead at household goods manufacturer McBride about moving people onto a non-customised S/4Hana implementation Continue Reading

By

• Cliff Saran, Managing Editor

Post Office prioritised its ‘bottom line’ over justice

The Post Office was more concerned with saving money and recovering unexplained losses than getting to the bottom of subpostmaster claims that Horizon errors caused shortfalls, inquiry told Continue Reading

By

• Karl Flinders, Chief reporter and senior editor EMEA

Currys data strategy takes major step forward with launch of Connected Media

Data is the foundation for the future success of the new Currys retail media platform, as the tech retailer’s CDO explains Continue Reading

By

• Ben Sillitoe

Undisclosed document could reveal pressure on Fujitsu expert witness in Post Office prosecution

Details of Post Office prosecutor’s meeting with Fujitsu IT expert witness, used in subpostmaster prosecution, not yet disclosed to public inquiry Continue Reading

By

• Karl Flinders, Chief reporter and senior editor EMEA

The Security Interviews: Mark McClain, SailPoint Technologies

SailPoint founder and CEO Mark McClain reflects on how the concept of identity has evolved over the past 20 years, and points to rapid evolution still to come Continue Reading

By

• Alex Scroxton, Security Editor

Post Office lawyer with his fingerprints all over IT scandal spreads blame

Senior Post Office criminal lawyer was just following orders and claims his only mistake was believing those that told him the Horizon system was robust Continue Reading

By

• Karl Flinders, Chief reporter and senior editor EMEA

Government’s Online Fraud Charter welcomed

The government has corralled 11 of the largest tech platforms in the world to commit to its Online Fraud Charter, designed to tackle online scams, fake adverts, and more Continue Reading

By

• Alex Scroxton, Security Editor

Slow government response to Post Office scandal compensation forces new legislation

Subpostmasters who exposed widest miscarriage of justice in UK history still waiting for compensation after decades of fighting Continue Reading

By

• Karl Flinders, Chief reporter and senior editor EMEA

Paula Vennells’ email fuelled Post Office Horizon cult, inquiry told

Faced with serious questions about the robustness of its core computer system, the Post Office doubled down on reliability myth, public inquiry told Continue Reading

By

• Karl Flinders, Chief reporter and senior editor EMEA

CCRC refers two posthumous subpostmaster appeals to Crown Court

CCRC refers posthumous appeals against convictions to Crown Court for first time Continue Reading

By

• Karl Flinders, Chief reporter and senior editor EMEA

UK retailer The Very Group embarks on GenAI push with AWS

The Very Group's collaboration with AWS is geared towards improving the customer experience through personalisation Continue Reading

By

• Caroline Donnelly, Senior Editor, UK

India's Hexaware creates hundreds of jobs in UK

Hexaware opens IT services operation in Birmingham, with a plan to recruit 250 people in the region by 2025 Continue Reading

By

• Karl Flinders, Chief reporter and senior editor EMEA

Kingfisher develops AI-agnostic platform to power DIY assistant

The platform provides a framework for security and compliance and enables developers to test different large language models Continue Reading

By

• Cliff Saran, Managing Editor

Royal Mail spent £10m on cyber measures after LockBit attack

Royal Mail has spent approximately £10m on recovery and improved cyber resilience measures in the wake of the January 2023 LockBit ransomware attack Continue Reading

By

• Alex Scroxton, Security Editor

Post Office scandal inquiry postpones more key witness hearings

Yet more witness hearings are cancelled due to the Post Office's late disclosure of documents Continue Reading

By

• Karl Flinders, Chief reporter and senior editor EMEA

Where tech can smooth out the retail returns process

New tech from supply chain companies, M&A activity among logistics firms, and H&M’s new fees show product returns is the retail industry debate that keeps coming back Continue Reading

By

• Ben Sillitoe

Rogue state-aligned actors are most critical cyber threat to UK

The prospect of rogue nation-state-aligned attackers bringing down the UK’s critical infrastructure is keeping the NCSC up at night Continue Reading

By

• Alex Scroxton, Security Editor

Victims’ legal action over 2015 Carphone Warehouse breach moves forward

A class action against Currys Retail over the 2015 data breach of Carphone Warehouse customers has been granted permission to move forward in the courts Continue Reading

By

• Alex Scroxton, Security Editor

NCSC makes annual Black Friday plea to consumers

Ahead of the annual festival of retail avarice, the NCSC is once again asking consumers to do the bare minimum to avoid falling victim to scams Continue Reading

By

• Alex Scroxton, Security Editor

Former Post Office manager has no memory of preparing witness statement in legal dispute

Evidence of computer problems was omitted from the witness statement of a former Post Office manager in a legal battle with a subpostmaster blamed for unexplained accounting shortfalls Continue Reading

By

• Karl Flinders, Chief reporter and senior editor EMEA

Post Office disclosure failures delay Horizon scandal inquiry again

Many of the 300,000 emails unearthed could be relevant to evidence from future and past witnesses in the Post Office scandal inquiry Continue Reading

By

• Karl Flinders, Chief reporter and senior editor EMEA

Netherlands starts building its own AI language model

Dutch government allocates €13.5m to develop an open artificial intelligence language model according to national values and guidelines. Continue Reading

By

• Kim Loohuis

How to solve the computer evidence problem

The Law Commission is in disgrace for its historic misrepresentations of IT experts when pushing a change to the law on the use of computer evidence through Parliament. Continue Reading

By

• Alistair Kelman

Law Commission misrepresented experts when it changed rule on computer evidence

The Law Commission repeatedly quoted vague, arm-waving, un-evidenced comments by judges who offered no insight into anything beyond their own technical ignorance. The law change made miscarriages of justice inevitable. Continue Reading

By

• James Christie

The cause of the Post Office Horizon scandal? The Law Commission? Judges? Lawyers?

The appropriateness of the current law on the use of computer evidence in court is under the spotlight following Post Office scandal revelations Continue Reading

By

• Stephen Mason

Darktrace CEO Poppy Gustafsson on her AI Safety Summit goals

As the AI Safety Summit at Bletchley Park takes place, Computer Weekly caught up with Darktrace CEO Poppy Gustafsson to find out what one of the UK’s most prominent AI advocates wants from proceedings Continue Reading

By

• Alex Scroxton, Security Editor

The world's most advanced Arabic LLM is now available on open source

On 30 August 2023, Abu Dhabi-based Inception, a subsidiary of G42, announced the release of an Arabic large language model to open source Continue Reading

By

• Pat Brans, Pat Brans Associates/Grenoble Ecole de Management

ChatGPT, Bard, lack effective defences against fraudsters, Which? warns

Consumer advocacy Which? warns that popular generative AI tools are vulnerable to loopholes that render existing protections against malicious usage easily bypassed Continue Reading

By

• Alex Scroxton, Security Editor

UK Finance paints mixed picture of fraud as losses top £500m

UK losses to fraud in the first six months of the year topped £500m, but a slight decline in overall crime rates was observed, according to UK Finance’s latest data Continue Reading

By

• Alex Scroxton, Security Editor

Post Office auditors presumed subpostmasters were ‘on the fiddle’ or ‘in a muddle’

Public inquiry into Post Office scandal hears how head office staff routinely made negative assumptions about subpostmasters in small branches Continue Reading

By

• Karl Flinders, Chief reporter and senior editor EMEA