Scotland Yard has announced that it plans to expand its cyber crime unit to 500 people.
According to a report in the Telegraph, there are plans to massively expand the unit in the coming years, eventually boosting the number to around 500. Adrian Culley, global technical consultant at Damballa and former head of the Scotland Yard Computer Crime unit, told IT Security Guru that he thought the news was “very encouraging”, especially since the formation of the National Crime Agency.
“Given the very difficult budget decisions and savings that have to be made, this growth highlights the ever growing importance of cyber crime.
“The challenge remains in selecting staff with the appropriate knowledge and aptitude, then providing them with additional skills and training. Retention will remain an issue too, with staff increasingly likely to be sought by other Government Units, never mind the increasing demand from industry,” he said.
Amar Singh, chair of the ISACA UK security group, said: “Intentions are certainly honourable, but government initiatives are known to get bogged down by bureaucratic processes; that is not to say that expanding the unit isn’t a great idea, but I still have to wonder where they will source their employees from.
“There appears to be an ongoing skills shortage in these niche areas and this is something that we, as an industry, must be addressing now in order for these initiatives to even begin to have a positive impact on the average consumer or SME battling the ongoing threats of cyber crime. Having said that, it is definitely a step in the right direction.”
Speaking to IT Security Guru, Professor Alan Woodward from the University of Surrey, said that he had been working with E-Skills on a government campaign to encourage people to consider cyber security as a career. “The problem is I don’t where they will get the people, they are talking about ramping from 70 to 500 and they have to peak people’s interest.
“Look at the GCHQ treasure trail, to do that you really had to know your stuff on cryptography and ciphers and how to embed images, but when you get a job you will only be paid £25,000 a year. The Met will struggle to achieve this, as will others, as we have got to have a hi-tech crime unit but I do not know where the people will come from. I fear that i could take months or even years to recruit the right people.”
