Industry
Information Assurance Collaboration Group (IACG)
CESG’s relationship with industry is a critical component of the UK’s
ability to create an enduring sovereign IA supply capability and they are
looking afresh at their approaches to partnering to sustain and complement
CESG’s role as NTA, particularly to support delivery of the National IA
Strategy. On top of its traditional service load, CESG is already facing
the demands of the scale of the IA Technical Programme and of the growing
threats to government networks. To ensure that we can continue to deliver
what is needed they must increase their capacity to deliver assurance by
improving their processes and working even more closely with industry.
To this end, CESG has established a new forum to share good practice in
collaborative working between industry and government IA practitioners.
This group, the Information Assurance Collaboration Group represents over
90% of HMG ICT suppliers and includes Atos, BT, CapGemini, Computacenter,
Detica, EDS, Fujitsu, HP, IBM, Juniper, LogicaCMG, Microsoft, Northrop
Grumman, Qinetiq, Siemens, SBL, Sopra, Symantec, and Thales. Through many
workshops since IA06 (the annual CESG hosted Information Assurance
conference) the group has met to work previously intractable collaboration
and trust issues to test new thinking for the common good. They have
ratified their Terms of Reference, appointed initial Officers, and agreed a
provisional Statement of Work aligned with their Intent “To collaborate
with CESG in order to deliver coherence between industry and the business
of government and so to extend and simplify the deployment of pragmatic,
appropriate and cost effective IA across the UK public sector.”
The group are already contributing to the National Strategy and Delivery
Plan and to-date have taken the unprecedented step of attending two CESG
SMT Strategy Brainstorms. In return, CESG will engage as a non-executive
non-voting member of the group and (at least initially) the only public
sector member.
CESG will work closely with the IACG to reshape their assurance services
and deliver what IATP needs.
Crypto Developer Forum (CDF)
The UK Crypto Developers Forum (CDF) is made up of UK based companies that
develop High Grade crypto capability for UK government. The CDF exists to
promote the global interest of the UK Crypto Development Industry by
influencing market and external stakeholders to achieve a sustainable
market and hence ensure the future of the UK High Grade crypto supply base.
The CDF works closely with Government to understand future requirements for
High Grade capability and to develop interoperable technical specifications
as required.
The CDF companies have recognised that the requirements for specific High
Grade crypto are increasingly driven by those companies (system/technology
integrators) that deliver systems, platforms, networks and services to
Government, rather than by Government directly.
