The NCF will conduct cyber operations to disrupt hostile state activities, counter terror plots, and support military operations, Johnson said in a speech on defence spending on Thursday.
The NCF draws together personnel from GCHQ, the Ministry of Defence (MoD), the Secret Intelligence Service (MI6), and the Defence Science and Technology Laboratory (DSTL) under one unified command for the first time.
“The UK’s new National Cyber Force is a world-leading force for good, capable of conducting targeted, responsible cyber operations to protect our national security,” said Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab.
“From defending against terrorism, to countering hostile state activity to tackling the scourge of online child abuse, the National Cyber Force brings together critical capabilities from across government to help protect the UK,” he said.
General Sir Patrick Sanders of Strategic Command compared the establishment of the new force to the founding of the Royal Air Force a century ago.
“Just over 100 years ago we created a new force to defend the UK from threats in a new domain—the air. Today’s announcement of the formation of the National Cyber Force to defend the UK in cyberspace marks a similar milestone and the imperative is just as vital because cyberspace is the most contested domain where our adversaries and our allies will meet over the next decade and beyond,” he said.
While the NCSC’s cyber operations are defensive in nature, the NCF’s operational mission is to degrade, disrupt, and even destroy communications systems used by the UK’s adversaries.
The UK has been a world leader in offensive cyber operations. In 2016, the Ministry of Defence confirmed the UK was conducting cyber operations against the ISIS terrorist group. In 2018, the GCHQ revealed how it had degraded ISIS propaganda networks through cyber operations.
The UK is facing cyber threats from not just terrorists and criminals, but also hostile foreign states including Russia and China.
