Openness and offensive cyber: Neil Ashdown
Offensive cyber capabilities are among governments’ most closely held secrets. As such, a public speech by a former senior intelligence official about these capabilities is rare. It is even more unusual for such a speech to call for more open debate on the topic. On the 10th of November, Ciaran Martin gave a speech entitled ‘ Cyber weapons are called viruses for a reason: statecraft, security and safety in the digital age’ . Although he spoke in his capacity as a Visiting Professor at King’s College London, Martin had an illustrious career in UK government, including as the founding chief executive of the National Cyber Security Centre (NCSC) in 2016. The UK intelligence agencies have been moving towards greater public engagement. Sir Alex Younger, then the chief of the Secret Intelligence Service (SIS), gave what the service described as a “rare public speech” on the future of espionage at the University of St Andrews in 2018. His successor, Richard Moore, retained his personal Twitte