Global IT Outage

Debate between Lord Clement-Jones and Baroness Twycross

Thursday 25th July 2024 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Twycross (Lab)]

I think we all have huge sympathy for those affected. As the noble Lord rightly says, thousands of people were affected on the day. However, compensation is a matter for the individual operators and subject to consumer rules, which would cover any entitlement to compensation or refunds.

[Lord Clement-Jones (LD)]

My Lords, in the light of recent events, we are clearly talking not just about bad actors. Does the Minister agree that there needs to be a rethink about critical national infrastructure and our dependence on a few overly dominant major tech companies for cloud services and software, which are now effectively essential public utilities? Will the Government reconsider how we are wholesale replacing reliable analogue communications with digital systems without any back-up?

[Baroness Twycross (Lab)]

The noble Lord raises critical issues, a number of which will be covered by the cybersecurity and resilience Bill. I would welcome the opportunity to discuss these issues with him further.