WARP Latest news

Summer is well and truly here, and though it has been a disgracefully long time since the last newsletter, (for which I apologise), that doesn’t mean there hasn’t been plenty going on in the WARP Programme. I’m particularly pleased to announce the date for the next Annual WARP Forum – 8th September 2009 in London, at the Law Society venue the same as last year. Once again we will be relying on sponsorship to make this happen and we have had positive responses from some of last year’s sponsors but Annette would be very pleased to hear from other sponsors.
Meanwhile there is a continuing dialogue on WARPs for London 2012 and how this is being taken forward. This is a really exciting opportunity which not only has the potential to make London 2012 a safer event in cyber terms, but also raise the profile of WARPs. To support this we have sponsored the creation of a WARP MSP to support engaging with London 2012 stakeholders.
As you can read below, there are some interesting EC initiatives on Trusted Information Sharing currently, notably MS3i (Messaging Standard for Sharing Security information), which has potential benefits for WARPs sharing across wider communities. In particular, this could be used on a new 2-year EC project called NEISAS (National and European Information Sharing and Alert System), which could be a way of spreading the WARP models across Europe. These will be discussed at the WARP Operator’s Forum and of course at the Annual WARP Forum at which we expect to have a strong international flavour once again.
We are still working towards establishing an independent WARP Trust although the recession has proved a temporary inconvenience, but we will get there. The WARP brand is being recognised more and more and we have had several unexpected WARP registration applications recently, both from the UK and internationally which will be posted on the WARP register shortly.
Speaking of international interest, the last item in the Newsletter provides an update on the Irish WARP, which has had a long gestation period, but is a great asset to the growing WARP community already. It was very gratifying to see the WARPs working together openly over the Conficker saga, including valuable engagement from Ireland and Japan. The Irish WARP has also proved the value of the WARP MSP route to get the WARP up and running quickly once the funding was established, and we hope to see more WARPs getting airborne much more quickly this way.

Peter B

WARP Programme Director

If you are interested in what was said before you can view the archive Newsletters.