MP calls for UK e-crime tsar

An MP has called for the creation of a cyber-security tsar and a national agency to combat the growing threat of cyber crime.

Mark Pritchard, Conservative MP for The Wrekin, used an adjournment debate last Wednesday to call for more action to address the impact that cyber crime may have on the UK's critical national infrastructure (CNI).

The agency should be a unified national cyber-security agency, which would be a single point of cyber-security information, guidance and advice for the nation," Pritchard argued.

Pritchard said: "The rise in aggressive viruses and cyber-security threats is a clear and present danger to Britain's national security. It is also a threat to Britain's economic well-being."

The MP also claimed that the UK's CNI was threatened by terrorist organisations.

He said: "It is interesting that the imprisoned al-Qaeda members have admitted that their organisation has been attempting to - and no doubt is still attempting to - develop cyber threats to strike western governments."

However, some security experts - including Bruce Schneier - aren't convinced that cyber terrorism is a serious threat. Speaking last week, Schneier said: "I think that the terrorist threat is over-hyped, and the criminal threat is under-hyped.

"I hear people talk about the risks to critical infrastructure [CNI] from cyber terrorism but the risks come primarily from criminals. It's just criminals at the moment aren't as 'sexy' as terrorists."

The CNI includes energy, transport, finance, telecoms and aviation, which constantly rely on an exchange of information, according to Pritchard, who suggested that the nuclear industry could be a target.

Pritchard said: "A penetration of any of those networks would be a serious threat to national security, not least when it comes to the potential to access Britain's 14 nuclear power stations."

He also claimed that cyber attacks had a detrimental effect on consumer confidence. He quoted a figure of 200,000 cases of internet-based identity fraud, at a cost to the UK economy of at least £16m. Online credit fraud has also increased by 29 per cent, he added.

In response, the government said Pritchard was making sensible suggestions, and stressed the need for secure networks but said it had no plans to regulate internet use.

Barry Gardiner, parliamentary under-secretary of State for Trade and Industry, said: "It is not the government's role to manage the internet, or regulate how business is conducted through it. There is a role for government and business to work together in a non-regulatory way."

The government also pointed to its creation of the National Infrastructure Security Coordination Centre and said it had recently allocated £30m to protect government information.

Tom Espiner writes for ZDNet UK