Computers and phones crash in Parliament as officials rush to fix issue
All the computers and phones on the parliamentary estate are down, sparking fears of a cyber attack
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All the computers and phones on the parliamentary estate are down, sparking fears of a cyber attack.
The annunciator screens, located across parliament, have a banner across the bottom reading: "There is an issue on the Parliamentary IT network and we are working to resolve it”.
A spokesperson for the UK Parliament said: “The IT issue affecting the Parliamentary network has been identified and is being addressed urgently.
The business of both Chambers is unaffected.”
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Officials did not rule out a cyber attack when asked by GB News but it is understood there is currently no indication of malicious activity.
Earlier this year, the UK Parliament banned Tik Tok from its network, amid cyber security concerns.
An email sent to MPs in March said: “Cyber security is a top priority for us all and we believe that this is a necessary step to ensure our parliamentary digital devices remain as secure as possible.”
This came after the app was banned on all Government devices.
TikTok said the decision is “misguided and based on fundamental misconceptions” about the company.
A report into cybersecurity in the UK, published by the House of Commons in June, warned that cyber threat to the UK comes from a "range of actors with differing motivations and levels of sophistication".
It adds: "They include state and state-sponsored groups, financially-motivated criminal organisations, and ‘hacktivists’ with political aims.
"The boundaries between these groups can be unclear.
"For example, cyber criminal groups can operate with the implicit backing of states and (especially since the war in Ukraine) may choose targets, in part, for political reasons."
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This year's Cyber Breaches Survey, conduced each year by the Department for Science, Innovation and Technology (DSIT) found that around a third of businesses and a quarter of charities had experienced a cyber attack in the previous 12 months.
The larger the organisation the more likely they were to have experienced an incident.
Some 69 per cent of large firms and 76 per cent of charities with annual incomes over £5 million reported breaches.