Question to the Cabinet Office:

To ask Her Majesty's Government what role private sector organisations will have in the Government’s cyber security work.

The National Cyber Security Strategy (NCSS) seeks to ensure that the UK is the safest place to live and work online. As such, the Strategy sets out action aimed at all sectors of society. Partnership with private sector organisations of all sizes is critical to HM Government’s ability to deliver on the ambition of the NCSS.

HM Government provides support through the NCSS to stimulate the sector of specialist cyber security companies, working to create a domestic pipeline of development and investment in products and services that will make systems and infrastructure more resilient. Together with private sector manufacturers, the Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport has recently published the Code of Practice for Consumer Internet of Things (IoT) Security to ensure that this emerging technology is secure by design. The private sector also contributes to the Government’s ambition of creating a sustainable pipeline of home grown cyber security professionals, playing a partnership role in programmes such as Cyber First and wider skills based initiatives.

The National Cyber Security Centre (NCSC) works directly with the private sector on the cyber threat and how to counter it, and companies act on advice from the NCSC to help them prepare for - and to respond and recover from – cyber incidents.