China, Russia using digital tech to sabotage, steal: UK

WE HAVE got to win hearts and minds across the world for our positive vision of cyberspace as a free space, said Raab.

London, May 12: It is important to win the “hearts and minds” of like-minded countries such as India to prevent countries like China and Russia from filling the multilateral vacuum and misusing digital technology to steal and sabotage, UK Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab warned on Wednesday.

In a keynote speech at the CyberUK Conference 2021 organised by the UK’s National Cyber Security

Centre (NCSC), the Cabinet minister issued a stark warning of all too real attacks on democracy as he announced GBP 22 million in new funding to support cyber capacity building in vulnerable countries in Africa and the Indo-Pacific.

We invited ministers to join the (G7) meeting from India, Australia, South Korea, South Africa and Brunei, the current ASEAN (Association of South East Asian Nations) chair; because we wanted to broaden the group of likeminded countries cooperating on cyber, Raab said.

We have got to win hearts and minds across the world for our positive vision of cyberspace as a free space, open to all responsible users and there for the benefit of the whole world. And frankly, we’ve got to prevent China, Russia and others from filling the multilateral vacuum, he said.

The minister made reference to a clash between authoritarian and democratic states playing out in cyberspace at the moment, with malicious cyber-actors the “industrial-scale vandals of the 21st century”.