IET in the news
We’ve been hitting the headlines across a range of media outlets.
Cyber Security Awareness Month
Following a wave of cyber-attacks, we kicked-off Cyber Security Awareness Month in October with new research revealing strong public concern over online safety. Among 2,000 UK adults surveyed, 70% said businesses should better protect personal data, and two-thirds called for more government investment. Despite rising fears – over half worry about being hacked and 74% see cybercriminals as more sophisticated – one in five still downplay the risks. Backed by IET experts and Get Safe Online, our campaign promoted best practice and gained widespread media coverage, including Sky News Radio, LBC News, BBC Three Counties, and over 500 local stations. The survey results also featured in The Engineer (online).
Award winners and finalists in the spotlight
October also saw the start of Awards season with winners from our Achievement Awards celebrated for their breakthroughs across renewable energy, quantum tech, digital media, and physical computing. You can read more about our Achievement winners on pages 4 and 5.
We also announced the five finalists for our Young Woman Engineer of the Year Awards on Ada Lovelace Day (14 Oct), celebrating rising stars across aerospace, transport, the built environment, and tech. These awards honour women who are not only excelling in modern engineering but also challenging outdated stereotypes and reshaping perceptions of the profession. Finalists Jennifer Barry, Amy Dillon, Rachel Donaghey, Rachel Hayden, and Nikkala Pokojski were profiled in their local and trade media, with coverage including BBC Radio Berkshire, and BBC Radio Cornwall.
Reacting to breaking news stories
Our experts shared their insight on the widespread web service outage linked to Amazon Web Services (AWS) back in October, which was caused by a networking issue affecting a core database system in a single data centre. Fellow Dr Junade Ali emphasised the risks of relying on single cloud regions and the importance of building resilience into essential services. Member Rimesh Patel highlighted how such outages can disrupt global operations, stressing the need for robust supply chain and infrastructure strategies. Digital Policy Panel member Dr Maurizio Pilu noted the extensive impact across regions and called attention to the vulnerability of concentrated digital infrastructure. Meanwhile, Fellow Nick Hunn warned that increasing system complexity and interdependencies – exacerbated by rapid AI-driven development – could make such failures more common, urging better training and awareness among developers to manage systemic risks. Junade featured on national outlet GB News, BBC News Online, and across several regional BBC and Heart radio stations.
With OpenAI’s announcement on the launch of its ChatGPT web browser, Atlas, providing everyday AI browsing for the public, Sky News wanted to chat with Fellow Junade for his insight.
You can see our media coverage in the press release section of our website here