Question to the Home Office:

To ask Her Majesty’s Government what steps they have taken to ensure that police forces are properly trained to respond to cybercrime.

Cyber attacks, including cyber crime, are a Tier One threat to national security, and the Government is investing £860 million over five years through the National Cyber Security Programme (NCSP) to respond. Of this, over 10% is being invested in building law enforcement capabilities to tackle cyber crime. This has been used to build capability at the national, regional, and local level. NCSP funding is being used to train officers in the National Cyber Crime Unit within the National Crime Agency (NCA), and cyber teams within each of the Regional Organised Crime Units so that officers are able to investigate the most serious cases of cyber crime. Over 3,500 NCA officers have completed Digital Awareness training, as part of equipping the next generation of highly skilled digital detectives.

We are also delivering training in cyber crime to officers in local police forces. The College of Policing has designed four training modules on cyber crime aimed at police officers and staff, on cyber, digital and social media. Since they were rolled out in 2013, over 150,000 of these modules have been completed. The College and police forces have also been delivering a classroom-based course to police investigators, which gives them the understanding of how to exploit intelligence and evidential opportunities offered by technology, social networking and communications data.