May promises £63m for cybercrime fight

Less than ten per cent of cyber security budget

By John Oates, 15th February 2011

Home Secretary Theresa May has announced a £63m boost to police budgets for combatting cyber crime.

The money will come from the £650m being spent on beefing up the UK's national cyber defences announced last year.

The move to a proactive, and attacking, form of cyber defence was explained to the Reg by "senior Whitehall officials" in 2009. They warned the newly-formed Office of Cyber Security, within the Cabinet Office, that the main threats to UK infrastructure comes from organised criminals, not terrorists.

Officials also made clear that attacks were no longer likely to be "online only" - 90 per cent of UK high street transactions are now "online" in some sense.

A potted statement from the Home Office said: "This proposed new funding will be used to develop the UK's overall response to cyber crime. The Government is determined to build an effective law enforcement response to the cyber crime threat building upon the existing expertise within SOCA and the Met Police Central e-Crime Unit.

"More details of the funding allocation will be made public in due course.”

The Home Office press office was unable to confirm the figure of £63m, which was reported by eGovmonitor reporting comments made by Theresa May. ®

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