Amazon Web Services

Debate between Lord Leong and Baroness McIntosh of Hudnall

Tuesday 21st October 2025 Lords Chamber

[Lord Leong (Lab)]

My Lords, as I said earlier, we have to be very careful that we do not speculate. AWS reported that this was not a cybersecurity incident but very much a technical incident to do with DNS.

[Baroness McIntosh of Hudnall (Lab)]

My Lords, the outage that occurred yesterday was obviously very serious, and let us hope that it was not a foreign actor intervening. However, the assumption that underpinned the way it was responded to was that it would be fixed, and fixed quickly. But we know that these kinds of attacks recently have not been fixed quickly and sometimes it has been necessary for organisations to use pretty basic skills, even going back to pen and paper. Can the noble Lord tell the House whether he feels that in general those very fundamental skills, which need to underpin people’s understanding of advanced technologies, are still there and can be reverted to if necessary in a crisis?

Jaguar Land Rover Cyberattack

Debate between Lord Leong and Baroness McIntosh of Hudnall

Tuesday 14th October 2025 Lords Chamber

[Lord Leong (Lab)]

I thank the noble Lord for that point. As far as private enterprise is concerned, the Government will not interfere in what private business organisations do. However, government can produce the tools and the guidance so that companies can have a more robust and resilient approach to cyberattacks. For example, the Cyber Governance Code of Practice shows a board of directors how effectively to manage the digital risks to the organisation. As I said earlier, all companies, if they have not done so, should conduct a comprehensive risk assessment of their digital and cybersecurity framework. They should apply for Cyber Essentials certification or the various other forms of certification and ensure that they have appropriate cyber insurance.

[Baroness McIntosh of Hudnall (Lab)]

My Lords, I hope that my noble friend has had a chance to read an interesting article in this week’s New Statesman by Oliver Pickup about the people who have so far been arrested in relation to recent cyberattacks, particularly those on Marks & Spencer and Jaguar Land Rover, noting that they are very young and that, on the whole, they have learned their skills in hacking and cybercrime through their engagement with cybergames which they start very young. Will my noble friend have a look at that article if he has not had a chance to read it? Can he tell the House in what way the Government are aware of this issue and how they are addressing it within the education system and engagement with young people?

[Lord Leong (Lab)]

I thank my noble friend for that question. I have not read the article, but I will surely do so. The Government recognise the major role that UK cybersecurity professionals play in enhancing and protecting UK security, and it is vital that we support them. However, the defences are pretty complex, and we need to be very careful. While there are robust safeguards and oversight, we have concerns about how any defence could be exploited by cybercriminals and significantly hinder the successful investigation and prosecution of bad actors, so the Home Office is working closely with the National Cyber Security Centre, law enforcement and industry on this issue and will provide an update in due course.