April 2025

CyberScotland updates

News and updates from CyberScotland and our partner network

CyberScotland Partnership launches new Secure Finance campaign

We launched our new campaign, Secure Finance, which highlights the growing threat of online fraud, from romance scams to fake cryptocurrency investments. The campaign themes have been selected based on data and insights from Police Scotland on the most reported crimes.

Scottish crypto crime soars 2,000% since 2019

Police Scotland has reported a staggering 2,000% increase in cryptocurrency-related crimes over the last six years, according to the force’s latest Policing in a Digital World report.

Scottish tech sector remains optimistic despite challenges

The outlook for the Scottish technology sector remains positive, according to the latest industry report from ScotlandIS. Despite a challenging economic and geopolitical climate, almost three quarters (73%) of firms expressed optimism for the year ahead, a feeling driven by expectations of growth and the promise of new opportunities for the sector. This is only down slightly from 78% last year.

Cyber and Fraud Hub launch new guidance on keeping children safe online

The Cyber and Fraud Hub has launched new guidance – Keeping Children Safe Online: A Guide for Parents, Carers, and Guardians. The guide aims to provide advice to parents, grandparents, carers, guardians, siblings and children themselves, highlighting key things to look out for to stay safe online.

Winners announced at the 2025 Scottish Cyber Awards

The Scottish Cyber Awards were held on 27 March, with winners including partners the Cyber and Fraud Centre – Scotland and the Scottish Cyber Coordination Centre. Congratulations to all of the deserving winners and finalists!

In other news…

Cyber security news from Scotland and the rest of the UK

Small businesses in Scotland lose £5,584 each year due to cyber-attacks

Small businesses across Scotland are losing a combined £386million a year to cyber hackers because they don’t have proper security measures, a study by Vodafone has found. The survey revealed that two-fifths (40%) of UK SMEs were victims of a cyber attack in 2024 alone.

First plans for Cyber Security and Resilience Bill revealed

The UK Government has unveiled its first plans for the upcoming Cyber Security and Resilience Bill. The bill means more organisations will be required to meet robust cyber security standards under legislation designed to make UK infrastructure more secure. The full policy statement is available on gov.uk

Half of firms stall digital projects in fear of cyber warfare

Critical digital transformation projects are being delayed and halted due to a perceived increase in the risk of state-sponsored cyber-attacks, according to Armis. 49% of responding UK organisations have experienced disruption to digital projects due to the threat of “cyber warfare” attacks. The 2025 Armis Cyberwarfare Report is based on a study of over 1800 global IT decision-makers (ITDMs), including 501 from the UK.

Cyber startups to get £36m boost with new seed fund

The British Business Bank has committed £36m to Osney Capitals Fund 1 to support pre- and early-stage startups in the cyber sector. The funding is the first UK-focused cyber specialist seed fund to focus exclusively on early-stage UK cybersecurity.

Man charged after cyber attack at train stations

A man has been charged after a cyber attack saw terror messages displayed across screens at Scotland’s busiest train stations in September. British Transport Police received multiple reports of a cyber security incident affecting Network Rail Wi-Fi services, provided by a third party, that displayed imagery “intended to incite religious hatred”.

UK FinTech body unveils plan to halve UK fraud

Innovate Finance, the UK industry body for FinTech, has joined growing calls to hold social media platforms responsible for growing cases of online fraud in an effort to promote its anti-fraud strategy. The industry body has created a plan – A Technology Strategy to Smash Fraud – with aims to halve the amount of fraud in the UK by 2028.

New organisation launches to boost Black representation in Scotland’s tech sector

Black Tech Scotland has launched, aiming to boost Black representation within Scotland’s technology sector. It is an offshoot initiative of Black and Scot, founded by Timi Adegunwa, aiming to increase diversity via training, networking and career progression work. The organisation is now in the process of rolling out several initiatives to drive engagement in up-skilling and workforce development, including meet-ups between Black professionals in Glasgow, Fife, Edinburgh and Inverness.

Gaming platform is most imitated in scams

Gaming platform Steam has topped the list for the most imitated brand in the first quarter of 2025, according to Guardio’s Brand Phishing Report for Q1 2025. Scammers have been targeting the massive gaming community by impersonating Steam to warn users about supposed account issues, like payment failures or suspicious login attempts. Microsoft, Meta and Roblox rounded out the top four most impersonated brands in phishing scams.

What is Signal, the messaging app used by Trump and White House officials?

Messaging app Signal inadvertently hit the headlines recently, when texts between President Trump and White House officials were leaked. Signal is a free, open-source messaging app launched in 2014 and used by an estimated 40-70 million people per month. It was built with security in mind and uses end-to-end encryption.

The CyberScotland Bulletin is a monthly roundup of news and updates on cyber security and resilience with a particular focus on Scotland. Feel free to forward it to anyone in your network who might benefit from it.

Please ensure you only take information from trusted sources. The NCSC has a useful glossary of cyber terms you may wish to reference while you read the bulletin.

For more regular updates follow CyberScotland on X or LinkedIn, Instagram, Facebook and BlueSky.

Updates