InfoSec 2016: Government Is Doing “An Awful Lot” On Cyber Security

The British government should be praised for the amount of investment and co-operation it is giving to businesses and the security industry in this country, one of the UK’s leading security vendors has claimed.

Intel’s Gordon Morrison told TechWeekEurope that the government is “doing an awful lot” when it comes to supporting cyber security in Britain following the launch of several major initiatives recently.

“The problem with cyber security is that its multi-dimensional, there’s a lot of things to do, such as awareness campaigns, we need to look at things like cyber essentials as well as the National Cyber Security Centre (NCSC),” Morrison told TechWeekEurope at the recent InfoSecurity Europe 2016 event in London.

“I think we should commend the government in launching the NCSC, which will make it easier for industry and government to see cyber threats, share threat information, and gain expertise and access to things like best practice.”

Complex

“Unfortunately we’re seeing more and more threats, we’re seeing an increase in complexity in our IT estate…it’s a huge issue,” Morrison added.

This growth is not being helped by the increasing cyber skills gap, which is potentially putting the UK’s businesses at risk of being attacked due to a shortage of qualified IT workers.

“We think there’s a skills gap of around two million over the next few years, in terms of qualified cyber people,” Morrison said, “so as well as trying to get more people involved in cyber security, we also need to look at how technology can help us keep up and alleviate this resource gap, so when we hire people into security, they go into the jobs they should be on.”

Check out the rest of Gordon’s interview below:

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