Better measures considered to better protect UK academia.
The UK’s leading research universities have been warned that foreign states are targeting them.
A recent briefing attended by MI5, NCSC and vice-chancellors of the Russell Group, a collective of the country’s 24 leading universities, deputy prime minister Oliver Dowden said universities “are being actively targeted by hostile actors and need to guard against the threat posed to frontier research in the most sensitive sectors.”
According to The Record, Dowden said the threat requires “further measures” said the deputy PM, who announced that the government was launching a consultation with the sector so it could “do more to support our universities and put the right security in place to protect their cutting-edge research.”
Among the measures being considered are increasing funding for universities to develop their own research security capabilities, increasing the transparency of funding flows going into academic institutions, and for MI5 to carry out security vetting on key researchers involved in a “small proportion of academic work, with a particular focus on research with potential dual uses in civilian and military life.”
Written by
Dan Raywood is a B2B journalist with 25 years of experience, including covering cybersecurity for the past 17 years. He has extensively covered topics from Advanced Persistent Threats and nation-state hackers to major data breaches and regulatory changes.
He has spoken at events including 44CON, Infosecurity Europe, RANT Forum, BSides Scotland, Steelcon and the National Cyber Security Show, and served as editor of SC Media UK, Infosecurity Magazine and IT Security Guru. He was also an analyst with 451 Research and a product marketing lead at Tenable.
