Question to the Ministry of Defence:

To ask the Secretary of State for Defence, what plans he has to increase the cyber skill capability of the armed forces.

Cyber is becoming an essential part of core military training. A dedicated state-of-the-art Defence Cyber School has opened at the Defence Academy, to deliver a centre of excellence for cyber training and exercising for defence and wider government.

The Defence Cyber School is approaching its first anniversary and has already trained specialist cyber military and civilian personnel, primarily from the Ministry of Defence (MOD). Its capacity will increase in 2019 and again in 2020.

A foundation training pathway is being implemented in 2019 which provides a recognised route to train personnel to pre-determined, internationally recognised cyber standards, providing the core skills to work in a range of key cyber roles across Defence.

The Defence Cyber School also has a synthetic training capability which supports the core skills taught in the classroom. This capability is available government wide and allows those in a Cyber specialist role to train flexibly away from the classroom and to maintain their skills to combat skill fade in this rapidly developing domain.

From a wider cross-Government civil perspective, Cabinet Office are leading on the development of a Government Security Profession and are working in partnership with the National Cyber Security Centre (NCSC) and all Government Departments to deliver a capability framework for cyber security professionals. The MOD is heavily engaged in this, with initial focus being on strengthening risk management and security architecture. The Cyber Security capability framework is planned for release in June 2019.