The threat of online attacks on national security has soared as North Korea and Russia pose as a greater threat
Ciaran Martin from the National Cyber Security Centre warns organised criminals have built a 'highly developed' market in cyber attack tools
THE threat of cyber attacks on Britain’s critical national security infrastructure from hostile states like Russia and North Korea has soared over the last two years, the UK’s cyber boss has warned.
Ciaran Martin, head of the National Cyber Security Centre, said North Korea now posed a greater financial threat rather than a political one.
And he told Parliament’s Joint Committee on National Security Strategy that the WannaCry cyber hack that targeted NHS computer systems last year had been a naked ploy to steal money.
Mr Martin also warned that organised criminals had built a “highly developed” market in cyber attack tools and techniques that allows a wider range of hostile countries to attack Britain.
Examples of tools being bought by these smaller nations included money laundering and data-mining techniques, he said.
He added: “So states of more modest means can acquire those capabilities and providing the cyber crime group is based in an area where western law enforcement arrangements do not apply, organised criminal groups can continue to threaten us.”
Alarmingly, Mr Martin warned that hackers were becoming more reckless, which meant their cyber attacks had spun out of control.
He told the committee that the two most serious attacks last year had spread “rapidly” and the impact “went well beyond the intentions of the attacker”.
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Warning about the rise in attacks from hostile nations, Mr Martin said: “In the last two years, - in terms of the behaviour of threat actors - we have seen a consistent rise in the appetite for attack from Russia on critical sectors, a diversification of what sectors they may attack.
“So in addition to what you might call more traditional targeting of hard infrastructure like energy infrastructure, we’ve seen of course against the West the targeting of softer power - democratic institutions, media institutions and things relating to freedom of speech.
“In terms of other state actors, we’ve seen a diversification of North Korea away from what might be called political retaliation attacks into frankly the theft of money - which was we believe to have been behind the Wannacry attack.”
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