Global PersPectives
espionage from other states, and the use of
cyberspace to finance and recruit terrorists,
top a long list of concerns. Britain’s response to
these concerns has been circumspect, creative,
and above all, collaborative.
Britain has been careful in its efforts to make
cyberspace more secure while not jeopardizing
freedom of expression or other civil liberties— a
difficult balancing act. Britain’s view is that any
support it gives in the form of cyber security–
capacity assistance must be guided by Britain’s
own conception of human rights, a view widely
shared in the Eu ro pean Union and North Amer
i ca. This precludes the use of cyber facilitated
censorship of free expression or the use of
cyber security technology to identify and per
secute minority communities.
Like most other developed economies tak
ing cyber security seriously, the UK started
by tasking its communications and security
ministries with securing the UK against cyber
threats believed to originate from another
state. The task of protecting the UK’s critical
national infrastructure (e.g., rail and communi
cations networks, energy storage and delivery
systems, and water sanitation and delivery)
remains complicated, however, by a need to
engage key players in the private sector: the
businesses that own the power plants, storage
facilities, and the like.
Britain recognized early on that its own
efforts to secure UK cyberspace could not suc
ceed without collaboration and cooperation,Like many of the world’s advanced industrial
economies, the United Kingdom has benefit
ted greatly from the growth in the distribution
and sophistication of the networked comput
ers that make up most of cyberspace. In 2011,
when the UK government published its cyber
security strategy, there were already 2 billion
Internet users around the world.a As of 2015,
there were just over 3 billion, many of whom
do not even own a computer, but instead access
cyberspace from an Internet enabled mobile
phone or tablet. From 2014 to 2015, the num
ber of British citizens accessing the Internet with
mobile phones, for example, rose 4 percent.
British broadband use has risen at a similar
rate, and the speed of connections has risen
in a single year from 17.8 Mbps to 22.8 Mbps.
Because most software for computers and
Internet devices is written in places such as
the United Kingdom, the economic value to
trade and commerce in cyberspace is im mense
and growing. With each new application, busi
nesses and individuals in the UK and abroad
are able to accomplish more tasks using fewer
resources, including time and money. Accord
ing to the data analy sis firm Ofcom, the Inter
net in the UK accounts for about 6 percent of
GDP, and as high as 21 percent of GDP growth.b
In short, the economic value of cyberspace to
Britain is critical.
But along with the increasing reliance on
cyberspace have come increasing threats and
vulnerabilities. Cyber crime, cyber attacks and
Cyber security has become a major global issue in the twenty- first century as more and
more of the world’s population gains access to the Internet and e- commerce. As an
island nation with a long maritime tradition and a colonial legacy, the United Kingdom
(UK) maintains an impor tant in de pen dent perspective on increasing its cyber security.