Every nation is engaging in cyber attacks, says News International CISO

Amar Singh tells Computing state-funded cyber warfare is already here and more needs to be done to protect against attacks

Almost all nation states are either carrying out cyber attacks or funding organisations to engage in cyber warfare on their behalf. That's according to News International chief information security officer (CISO) Amar Singh (pictured), who says this is a common belief among security professionals.

The United States and China have openly accused one another of being perpetrators of cyber attacks.

"One thing I can definitely confirm is I speak to several anti-malware device CISOs, and all of them have a similar message where it's almost every nation doing it. Literally, almost every nation is engaging in some kind of exploratory or retaliatory attack," Singh told Computing.

"Whichever way you look at it, there is hardly any nation of any size not either directly or indirectly sponsoring some kind of cyber warfare, or whatever you want to call it."

Singh added that the potentially unlimited funding available for government-sponsored cyber attacks is creating a difficult situation for many organisations.

"That's the challenge, because a state-sponsored attack is going to be well-funded, well-resourced, with almost unlimited potential," he said.

When asked if the government is doing enough to defend the UK against cyber attacks, Singh told Computing that it's heading in the right direction, but there's a skills gap that needs to be addressed.

"I think they're taking the right steps. The biggest challenge is there is a generation or more of people who aren't necessarily technically competent," he said.

"I think they are looking to try to address that, but I do sincerely hope it's not too late because you have a generation or more of people who have only been taught how to use Microsoft Word at school."

Describing the future as "almost certainly completely cyber", Singh compared the need for better skills in cyber security to having a car needlessly repaired by an unscrupulous garage, in that better knowledge will result in fewer people being caught out.

"You can use the analogy of unless you know how your car works to a high level, your mechanic is going to completely rip you off," he said.

"I think if you use that same analogy back in the cyber world, you need to have some basic grounding apart from just knowing how to use Facebook, Twitter, Microsoft Word. I think new generations need to have a bit more grounding in everything digital."

Earlier this year, a National Audit Office report warned that the UK is open to cyber attacks due to a lack of experts available to thwart threats, and that it could take 20 years to address the skills gap.