GCHQ will crack Kremlin’s cyber attacks in the same way it thwarted Isil, says director

THE intelligence services can “degrade” the Kremlin’s cyber capabilities in the same way they dismantled Isil’s online propaganda machine, the director of GCHQ has said.

Jeremy Fleming said that the surveillance agency’s expertise has never been in greater demand in the wake of the Salisbury attack.

Speaking at a cyber security conference in Manchester yesterday, the former MI5 officer likened Russia’s growing list of “reckless” transgressions to the Islamist terror group, adding that the agency stood ready to deal with both state and non-state actors.

In the same way that GCHQ helped “systemically and persistently” thwart Isil’s online network, Mr Fleming said the agency was testing its cyber defences in a manner similar to the emergency services preparing for a crisis.

“The Russian government is widely using its cyber capability. They’re not playing to the same rules,” he said. “They’re blurring the boundaries between criminal and state activity… To stay ahead, to match the pace of technological change, we are investing in deploying our own cyber tool kit. It’s one that combines offensive and defensive cyber capabilities, to make the UK harder to attack, better organised to respond when we are, and able to push back if we must.”

It comes a day after GCHQ announced the creation of a new base in Manchester, which Mr Fleming said would ensure the agency is able to draw on a “huge new pool of talented, tech-savvy recruits” to work alongside other intelligence agencies to defeat terrorism, organised crime and a growing pool of cyber hackers plotting attacks against the UK.