MoD Secret Systems Have Been Breached
The retiring head of the military’s cyber security operation admits the MoD’s network has been breached a number of times
Top secret systems belonging to the British government’s Ministry of Defence (MoD) have been breached by hackers, with a number of “serious incidents” hitting the department, according to one of the military’s senior figures.
Major General Jonathan Shaw, the head of the military’s cyber security operation, admitted the MoD’s network had been hacked, but would not be drawn into saying by whom or in what manner.
“The number of serious incidents is quite small, but it is there,” he told the Guardian. “And those are the ones we know about. The likelihood is there are problems in there we don’t know about.”
Wacky ideas
Shaw said the older generation running the show at the MoD needs to learn lessons from youngsters when it comes to security, embracing “wacky ideas” to best protect the nation’s secret. He suggested a bounty programme run by tech giants like Facebook and Google, in which financially rewards researchers who find vulnerabilities, could be the kind of idea the MoD should latch onto.
“My generation … we are far too old for this; it is not what we have grown up with. Our natural recourse is to reach for a pen and paper. And although we can set up structures, we really need to be on listening mode for this one,” he added.
He also revealed next year’s MoD budget should get fresh funds for cyber defence. That may come from the £650 million pot the government has pledged for cyber security, which will cover the next few years until the General Election in 2015.
“I think it was a surprise to people this year quite how vulnerable we are, which is why the measures have survived so long in the [budget] because people have become aware of the vulnerabilities and are taking them seriously,” Shaw added. He also called for the development an array of cyber weapons.
Government infrastructure faces plenty of cyber attacks. Just yesterday, TechWeekEurope broke that a distributed denial of service (DDoS) attack had crippled the Serious Organised Crime Agency’s (SOCA) website.
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