NCSC Supports Industry Drive Towards Common Standards

NCSC SUPPORTS INDUSTRY DRIVE TOWARDS COMMON STANDARDS FOR SECURE COMMUNICATION

• NCSC joins not-for-profit membership organisation Secure Chorus
• Membership underlines support for common standards for enterprise secure communication
• Much needed public-private collaboration forum for long-term security of the global digitally enabled economy

The National Cyber Security Centre (NCSC) has joined the not-for-profit membership organisation, Secure Chorus, as a Government Member.

Secure Chorus serves as a platform for public-private sector collaboration and is committed to developing a security baseline for the digital economy in the field of secure multimedia communication.

As part of its remit to make the UK the safest place to live and do business online, the NCSC is always seeking to raise the standard of defences by developing innovative measures that secure our digital services and protect the UK at scale.

The NCSC recognises and supports the role that Secure Chorus is playing to contribute to the development of a safer UK digital economy, which is one of the reasons it has joined the group.

The NCSC has joined Secure Chorus alongside major global telecommunication operators, system integrators, defence prime contractors, technology companies, academic institutions and trade bodies including Vodafone, O2, BAE Systems Applied Intelligence, Leonardo, Sepura, Serbus, Cryptify, Armour Communications, SQR Systems, ISARA Corporation, Secoti, Surevine, Galaxkey, Cyber Synopsis, CSIT, UCL and techUK.

Dr Ian Levy, Technical Director of the National Cyber Security Centre said:

“One of the key objectives of the National Cyber Security Centre is to enable a safe digital economy and we see easy, secure communication for enterprises as key to that.

“Secure Chorus will play a role in convening a much-needed forum to bring together global industry, governments and academia to promote the development of an ecosystem of secure and interoperable products based on open standards.”

Secure Chorus was originally formed in 2012 as an industry-led working-group, focusing on supporting the UK government’s requirement for protecting OFFICIAL and OFFICIAL SENSITIVE communications, with the aim of ensuring that any multimedia communication in UK government is appropriately protected.

Secure Chorus’ new structure has allowed the creation of a global platform for public-private sector engagement, to support the development of forward looking strategies, common standards and tangible capabilities all aimed at building cyber resilience in the field of multimedia communication for the enterprise. The requirement for secure multimedia communications exists across a variety of sectors including central government, public safety, financial services, healthcare, power and other critical national infrastructure.

Elisabetta Zaccaria, Chairman of Secure Chorus said:

“We recognise that the global digital world needs baseline security as much as the non-digital world. We firmly believe that this can only be achieved through increased public-private collaboration and development of common standards. We are delighted to see that our vision and modus operandi aligns with several important initiatives at global level, such as the recent launch of the World Economic Forum Centre for Cyber Security.”

Secure Chorus is currently focusing on several initiatives which have engendered the development in collaboration with its industry members of a growing ecosystem of secure and interoperable products, services and infrastructure for multimedia communication. Their work also includes the development of a Post-Quantum Identity Based Crypto Scheme to update Secure Chorus’ current cryptography standard of choice. The aim of this ecosystem approach is to enable secure, cross-platform multimedia communications which are highly scalable and flexible and give the domain manager full control of the security of the system.

Each one of these initiatives is an ambitious effort to contribute to the development of a safer UK digital economy.

About the National Cyber Security Centre

• The UK Government is fully committed to defending against digital threats and set up the National Cyber Security Centre last year through the five-year National Cyber Security Strategy, supported through £1.9 billion transformative investment.
• The NCSC provides a single, central body for cyber security at a national level and is the UK’s technical authority on cyber. It manages national cyber security incidents, carries out real-time threat analysis and provides tailored sectoral advice.
• GCHQ is the parent body for the Centre, meaning that it can draw on the organisation’s world-class skills and sensitive capabilities.