back to article George Osborne fires starting gun on £20m coding comp wheeze

Security vendors and training organisations have welcomed plans by the UK government to open a £20m competition along with a new “Institute of Coding”. The proposals were floated during a speech by UK Chancellor George Osborne on cyber-security and the fight against terrorism at GCHQ on Tuesday, during which also he announced …

  1. Tom 7

    I'd like to introduce Roger whose just graduated from the Institute of Coding.

    Well thanks Roger but can you just disable that bit.

    That's the security you hired me to code in from the beginning.

    I know but I cant be arsed to go through the hoops to get to this bit of information so if you'll just turn it off I'll let you know when I've done so you can switch it back on.

    .

    ,

    ,

    ,

    ,

    ,

  2. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    And the winners are...

    In the tradition of government-sponsored coding competitions, we can be pretty sure this will be won by a a team of jolly schoolgirls, who will be presenting some beautiful, pony-based designs.

    1. Unep Eurobats
      Paris Hilton

      Re: And the winners are...

      'a team of jolly schoolgirls'

      ... with black-painted fingernails, if the picture's anything to go by. (Paris would use aubergine.)

    2. Tom 38

      Re: And the winners are...

      Don't be daft, the winners here are Rohan Silva and his merry band of pick-axe sellers.

  3. smudge
    Holmes

    “Our world is run on software – medical devices, finance, IoT, access to knowledge via Internet, etc – so any foundational security training must include the ability to code securely.”

    Which should include the use of encryption on messages sent between sensitive devices and systems, such as medical devices, finance, IoT. Except that only terrorists, paedos and drug-dealers do that...

  4. SVV

    George Osbourne, expert economist AND cyber security guru

    Did he wear a hard hat in the publicity photos at the launch, like he nornmally does in photo oportunities?

    If not, someone should have shown him all the photos of Petter Norton on the front of all "his" books and internet security software boxes and told him that this is how internet security professionals dress.

    1. allthecoolshortnamesweretaken

      Re: George Osbourne, expert economist AND cyber security guru

      I know, right? Is there, like, nothing the guy can't do? Amazing!

      Upvote for the Peter Norton reference, triggering a lot of memories. Mostly good ones, as nostalgia tends to blot the bad ones.

      On a related note: I'd kinda like it if all the cabinet menbers would wear hard hats all the time.

  5. Spaceman9

    My mates business needs more money ..

    How about investing this money, in Schools, Colleges, and Universities, where the majority of students ought to learn about this stuff. Rather than select institutions, and irrelevant "competitions"

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: My mates business needs more money ..

      This does seem a weird priority when a very great deal of spending which actually serves a useful purpose is being cut.

      What was the thinking? £20m. We could put it towards trying to maintain some of the more critical services being axed, or we could just piss it away on a "competition".

      1. allthecoolshortnamesweretaken

        Re: My mates business needs more money ..

        20mil for critical services = drop in the ocean

        20mil for "competition" = exellent ROI in terms of PR

    2. PhillW

      Re: My mates business needs more money ..

      See year of code and Rohan Silva, who seemed to advise the government to spend money on code then set up a nice little venture to slurp most of it up.

      This will be the same few dozen faces, they will give a challenge, then invite the 100 odd people who bother to take part down to some back room in a restaurant in London, bung them some sarnies and Vimto, hand a crap plastic trophy to one of the posher, camera friendly, ones and pocket £20 million.

      Next week, back to Osborne with the fantastic idea of a Graphics coding compo and could he spare another 20 million.

  6. John Lilburne

    World problems solved

    10 PRINT "TORIES EAT SHIT AND DIE"

    20 GOTO 10

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: World problems solved

      I assume your call to GROWUP is at 30?

  7. Camilla Smythe

    1% and GCHQ

    Presumably GCHQ, yes you less than credible wankers as Jam in Your Doughnut, do not have a clue and will be relying on the 1% of coders introduced to the program who are going to rail against it to point out where, why and how shit the course is....

    Oh... Silly Me A++++++++ E-Bay Grades all around.

    1. Captain Badmouth

      Re: 1% and GCHQ

      "Oh... Silly Me A++++++++ E-Bay Grades all around."

      All must have prizes.

  8. Graham Marsden
    Big Brother

    Secure coding...

    ... but don't forget to include that backdoor for GCHQ...

  9. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Is this the same organisation...

    .. which was being run by an Tory party ApparatChick who didn't know how to code?

    1. allthecoolshortnamesweretaken

      Re: Is this the same organisation...

      Heh. Or as a well-known PHB once said...

  10. Adrian 4

    Cyber ?

    OOoh, retro, too. It's like Austin Powers or something.

  11. Anonymous Coward
    Trollface

    Perhaps if they taught decent programming principles in the first place

    Instead of going for quick-win web-wankery, they might just breed some decent programmers who'd program robustly and defensively where appropriate from the start.

POST COMMENT House rules

Not a member of The Register? Create a new account here.

  • Enter your comment

  • Add an icon

Anonymous cowards cannot choose their icon