The UK's National Cyber Security Centre (NCSC) has said there are “no indications” that a flaw in the PHP coding language has been successfully exploited by hackers to breach government computer systems.
Ollie Whitehouse, chief technology officer at the NCSC, told BBC Radio 4's World at One that incidents like the recent computer system shutdowns caused by the coding problem were likely to re-occur.
Continuous investment needed
Whitehouse said: “[This] highlights to a lot of organisations that technology is not a one-time purchase now, that it needs that continuous investment throughout its operational lifetime.”
He added: “We’re in an era now of digital dependency, coupled with heightened cyber threat, coupled with increasing capability, which means all organisations are going to likely have to revisit their risk assumptions and work out how they are able to invest in technology to be able to meet the contemporary era.”
Coordinated disclosure and website shutdowns
Whitehouse also said the problem that led to 32 government websites being temporarily shut down was originally identified months ago. The NCSC had been conducting a “coordinated disclosure process” to warn organisations of the vulnerability, until a leak meant that the process had to be accelerated.
The temporary shutdown of the 32 government websites occurred as a result of the PHP flaw, which has caused website outages globally.
