National Cyber Security Centre

Debate between Lord Ahmad of Wimbledon and Lord Clement-Jones

Monday 16th October 2023 Lords Chamber

[Lord Ahmad of Wimbledon (Con)]

I totally agree with the noble Baroness and assure her that we work very closely with our key international partners in calling out some of these cyberattacks against companies or even government websites and systems. We seek to act together and have done so. She will be aware that at the beginning of next month we will host an AI summit, which the Prime Minister is overseeing, very much aimed at exactly what she articulates—how we can learn from each other while improving our responses. I always say that, for cyber and many of the other challenges we face, as good as mitigations or mechanisms may be, those who seek to cause us harm—be it to business or directly to the Government—are looking at new ways to overcome them, so we will continue to share and co-operate with our key partners and allies on this.

[Lord Clement-Jones (LD)]

My Lords, a few weeks ago, the National Cyber Security Centre issued a warning about the risks of “prompt injection attacks” on the new large language models such as ChatGPT when used in the workplace, which enable them to be open to manipulation. What are the Government doing to ensure that they mitigate that risk in their own workplaces?

[Lord Ahmad of Wimbledon (Con)]

My Lords, as I have said, we are working across government and internationally. I think we all recognise the catch-up element with the evolution of these new methods. There are transformational elements with new innovations—that is why I referred to the AI summit, which is intended not just to avail us with the opportunities these new technologies present, as the noble Lord articulated, but to address the challenge and high risk presented to government, industry, sectors and individuals.

Noble Lords may recall the sad occasion when this very Parliament was attacked physically. I remember the emotional exchanges and statements made at the time, including by my noble friend Lady Evans. There was another attack at that time, on the parliamentary emails of many Members of this House and the other place. The knowledge base available for mitigation was limited, as was awareness. I think most Members and colleagues were concerned about getting their machines and devices up and working rather than about the data loss. The more learning, education and information we can share, the better we will be at mitigating some of these risks.