Cyber Attack Surface Growing Exponentially

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MI6, UK’s secret intelligence service, is pursuing partnerships with the technology industry to tackle the challenges posed by nation-states, cyber-criminals and global terrorists. Head of the Secret Intelligence Service (SIS), Richard Moore, has said the service cannot source all of its tech capabilities in-house.

“Through the National Security Strategic Investment Fund we are opening up our mission problems to those with talent in organizations that wouldn’t normally work with national security,” he added. These partnerships will increasingly be needed in areas such as artificial intelligence (AI), quantum computing and synthetic biology.

New tech capabilities will help address MI6’s four key priorities: Russia, China, Iran and global terrorism. It’s a challenge made more acute as technology rapidly advances, he said.

“The ‘digital attack surface’ that criminals, terrorists and hostile states threats seek to exploit against us is growing exponentially. We may experience more technological progress in the next ten years than in the last century, with a disruptive impact equal to the industrial revolution,” Moore argued, according to infosecurity-magazine.com.

Watch an intriguing panel discussion on the shortage in technological manpower in Israel and the world, held at INNOTECH 2021:

Meanwhile, the US is turning to hackers for help in the quest for cybersecurity. US Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) Director Jen Easterly said she wants to “ignite the hacker community” in the country’s fight against cyberthreats from abroad and within, according to fortune.com.