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Top 10 cyber security stories of 2025 | Computer Weekly
Artificial intelligence (AI) may have dominated wider tech headlines this year – and this held true in the cyber world as well – but at the same time, the security community’s concerns extend far beyond the risk implications of fully autonomous technology, as Computer Weekly’s annual top 10 round-up reflects.
Five years after Covid-19, it’s fair to say that the pandemic remade security, turning it from a specialist subject into something on which everyone has an opinion, and some of the biggest themes to emerge from the dark days of lockdown – remote work and supply chain security – remained talking points in 2025, too.
Another leitmotif was the emergence of quantum computing, and specifically the threat it poses to encryption, while in the US, radical shifts in policy under a new presidential administration had big ramifications for the industry.
Here are Computer Weekly’s top 10 cyber security stories of 2025.
We start with one of the more curious and long-running stories of the past year, the scandal surrounding North Korean operatives who obtained remote IT contractor positions with US companies to generate funds for the isolated regime. Towards the end of January, the US Department of Justice (DoJ) announced the indictment of five men – two North Koreans, a Mexican and two American citizens – in the case.
The prevalence of remote workers, especially since the Covid-19 pandemic, has made virtual job interviews a fact of life, and despite even more organisations issuing return to office (RTO) orders, many continue to hire for fully remote positions where their employees may rarely, if ever, physically meet. Threat actors have been quick to spot this gaping loophole in enterprise security, and human resources departments have been scrambling to respond.
The growth in speculation around the potential of quantum computing and its impact on the security world was a huge topic of conversation this year. In March, the UK’s National Cyber Security Centre (NCSC) published guidance to help support organisations as they get ready for quantum.
While its possibilities appear fantastic, in the medium term the dawn of quantum computing will render current encryption methods used to protect sensitive data obsolete, and the race is now on to develop effective post-quantum cryptography, or PQC. According to the NCSC, organisations should already be planning for PQC, ahead of technical upgrades in the early 2030s. The cyber agency wants the UK’s most at-risk organisations to have fully migrated to PQC by 2035 at the latest.
Supply chain security has become a fixture in the cyber world over the past few years, and the topic still dominated headlines in 2025. In May, the NHS’s digital chiefs wrote to their suppliers asking them to sign up to a cyber covenant.
The NHS has a long and troubled history of cyber attacks and data breaches – with attacks on partners such as OneAdvanced and Synnovis disrupting services and demonstrating the supply chain risks faced by healthcare organisations. The health service asked suppliers to commit to higher standards around supporting and patching systems, deploy multifactor authentication (MFA), always-on cyber monitoring and critical infrastructure logging, and immutable backups, among other things.
Even though it was established during his first administration, the US Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) was not immune to the deep and sweeping cuts enacted by president Donald Trump as his second term kicked into high gear.
With longstanding officials ousted, budget cuts abounding, and threats to the long-running CVE programme that identifies and classifies dangerous vulnerabilities, the US cyber establishment was rocked to the core in 2025, with knock-on effects spreading beyond America’s borders.
With Microsoft’s longest-lived operating system, Windows 10, finally falling out of support in October, there were warnings for users across the UK during the summer of 2025 – prepare to upgrade now, or put your security at risk.
The NCSC’s chief technology officer, Ollie Whitehouse, said that not upgrading was akin to “incurring a debt at a high interest with the threat of forced repayment at a later date” as he implored organisations to upgrade their PC estates. The agency warned that, in addition to the difficulties users will see from being out of support, outdated and now unpatched Windows 10 systems will be prime targets for threat actors – harking back to the WannaCry incident in 2017, which exploited unpatched versions of Windows XP.
The UK government made progress on its Cyber Security and Resilience Bill in 2025, and was finally able to lay it before Parliament in November. Ahead of this, the usual round of consultations, debates and evidence-gathering sessions took place, and in July, the Home Office announced that a legal ban on making ransomware payments – covering hospitals and other public health bodies, public sector organisations such as councils and schools, and operators of critical national infrastructure (CNI), including datacentres – would be included.
Enacting a ransomware payment ban has broad support nationally – the majority of responses to a consultation on the matter supported it – but the subject remains a controversial one, with some sceptical that the ban will make critical UK organisations less attractive targets for cyber criminals and may actually make it harder for some to recover if and when they get hit.
The annual Black Hat cyber fair in Las Vegas brings together security professionals and hackers of all kinds, and always throws up a few oddities. This year, Cisco Talos researchers revealed a series of vulnerabilities – dubbed ReVault – affecting the security firmware and associated application programming interfaces (APIs) in Dell laptops.
During the course of their research, the Talos team discovered that if a vulnerable system was configured to accept a biometric fingerprint login, it was possible to tamper with the firmware so that the fingerprint reader would accept a non-human physical input. In what was surely a first for the security industry, the researchers posted a video online in which they defeated a laptop’s biometric security measures using a spring onion.
Back in the quantum realm, two years after the debut of its Quantum Safe Programme (QSP), Microsoft reported steady progress on incorporating PQC algorithms into some of the foundational components underpinning the security of its product suite in August.
For a tech company as ubiquitous as Microsoft, quantum security is a non-negotiable – getting it wrong could lead to disaster – so Redmond wants to move fast and hopes to have its core services secured before the end of the 2020s. Its overall strategy rests on three core pillars: updating Microsoft’s own and third-party services, supply chain and ecosystem to be quantum-safe; supporting its customers, partners and ecosystems in this goal; and promoting global research, standards and services around quantum security.
In October, political chaos in Washington DC overflowed into the security realm when the federal government was forced to shut down after temporary funding measures failed to get through a deeply divided Congress. Unfortunately, this stalled progress on extending or replacing an Obama-era threat data sharing law, CISA 2015, which expired at the end of September.
CISA 2015 set out a framework for information sharing and offered liability protections to organisations sharing threat data and cyber intelligence in the public interest. Experts feared its absence would not only hurt collaboration between the public and private sectors, but also reduce the US’s ability to act as an effective counterweight to cyber criminals and other threat actors on the world stage. Although CISA 2015 has now been extended, the possibility of another shutdown in early 2026 could cause this story to rear its head again very soon.
Security professionals need only look at the monthly Patch Tuesday alerts to see how Microsoft’s technological dominance puts it at the centre of so many cyber security stories, and the firm frequently comes in for flak from those who think it is not doing enough to fulfil its security obligations. Such voices were in full flood at the end of 2025 when the Australian, Canadian and American cyber intelligence agencies took the step of co-signing an emergency alert and issuing a guide to securing Microsoft Exchange server instances, a key vector in many of history’s most impactful cyber incidents.
The document laid out several proactive protection techniques to be applied to on-premise Exchange Servers as part of hybrid environments, and the Americans described it as a “critical resource” for Microsoft users. But one observer, a former White House cyber policy expert, said that the fact a multilateral coalition felt obligated to produce such a resource was a “devastating commentary on Microsoft’s security posture”.
Out of the dozens of services I’ve tested, Home Chef is my favorite meal kit service for beginner cooks. It’s super user-friendly thanks to the detailed instructions and simple, delicious recipes. If you’re experienced in the kitchen, you’ll still love the end results, but this service is especially great for cooks building their confidence. Every dish has a difficulty rating and recipes have helpful notes for things like reserving portions of an ingredient or keeping a fond-encrusted pan that you’ll deglaze later. If you’ve been wanting to try this service, we’ve got a Home Chef promo code worth checking out.
Get 18 Free Meals With Home Chef Promo Code
Right now, new users can get 18 free meals, free shipping on the first box, and a free dessert item for life with this Home Chef promo code. The promo is applied as a 50% discount each week for the first four weeks. You’ll need to get at least 10 servings per week for the discount to be applied, which means fewer trips to the grocery store and a ton of new recipes in your culinary arsenal.
Save 50% on Your First Box With Home Chef Coupons
Especially with inflation and rising costs on seemingly everything, Home Chef is making it more affordable (and easier) to get nutrient-packed, yummy meals for the whole family. Home Chef has a Kids Eat Free offer, which gives 50% off the regular price of your first box and 17% off the regular price of your next 4 boxes on Home Chef Family orders. These wallet-friendly options start at $6.99 per serving, and for a limited time, you can get 18 free family plan meals with a Home Chef promo code.
Home Chef rewards everyday heroes with a Home Chef promo code for 50% off the first box, plus an additional 10% off. The heroes discount is for doctors, nurses, hospital employees, military, first responders, and teachers. All you have to do is verify your status through ID.me during the sign up process to get the Home Chef discount. Existing customers can still receive it, too, by verifying on their account’s payment page.
Enjoy These Meals With Your Home Chef Coupon
Home Chef’s weekly menu has filters for dietary preferences like keto-friendly meals or calorie-conscious dinners, plus a filter for under-30-minute recipes for when you’re in a time crunch. You can also check out oven-ready prepared meals, family meals for quickly getting dinner on the table, and tasty extras like soups and flatbreads. Everything will arrive pre-portioned right to your doorstep (and for less dough with this Home Chef coupon).
Two things I always watch for with supplements, even with guidance from my doctor: Does it have a CGMP certification, and is there any data to back up the marketing claims? CGMP stands for “Current Good Manufacturing Process,” which are FDA guidelines put in place for a product’s safety. This includes where and how it was made, as well as what it was made of. But even with this kind of baseline, it’s hard to tell what additives are used in a supplement and how that can counteract its effects or react with your body chemistry.
So, Can I Take Melatonin or Not?
I tell you these things out of an abundance of caution. If your doctor gives you the go-ahead to use melatonin, follow their advice. Kuhlmann says he advises his patients to start at 3 milligrams but to never take more than 10 milligrams. For kids, he also urges speaking to a pediatrician and/or a sleep medical professional.
Melatonin also can’t do all the heavy lifting, and timing is crucial. As part of maintaining good bedtime habits, he also emphasizes the importance of taking it on time, at the same time, nightly. This will help establish the wind-down routine your brain follows via its circadian rhythm; as we established earlier, melatonin is supposed to lead this process.
If you’re keen on keeping melatonin in your bedtime routine, WIRED reviewer Molly Higgins tested and recommends Onnit’s Instant Melatonin Spray, which comes in two flavors: mint and lavender. (She tested the latter.) The standard serving size—six oral sprays—equals 3 milligrams of melatonin, which she found immediately made her sleepy. She did find she needed to increase her dosage over time to attain the same result, but, as we established above, it’s best to stay within the 10 milligram threshold.
For those of you who are just researching options, consider these alternatives. Diet and exercise, as tired as you may be of hearing that, really are essential to getting good, quality sleep. Case in point: You took a CrossFit class for the first time and are ready to conk out right after you manage to get dinner and a shower. Something else to consider: Perhaps relying on melatonin or a sleep supplement is treating a symptom you’re dealing with, as opposed to the actual issue impacting your sleep.
Bedtime Habits
Photograph: Martin Cizmar
LectroFan
High Fidelity White Noise Machine
It’s hard to overstate the importance of sleep hygiene and bedtime routine habits—a sleep supplement won’t be the end-all and be-all. Also, no caffeine after a certain time of day—you know your body best, but I’d say early afternoon at the very latest. Also, I’m sorry to my fellow readers and late-night scrollers, but devices need to be put away an hour or more before bedtime. Blue light that radiates from devices’ screens mimics that of sunlight, and your brain can’t discern the difference. All it knows is there’s still “daylight” that you need to be awake for, and that prolongs the falling-asleep process.
Other alternatives to supplements in the pursuit of better sleep can include sound machines (my favorite is above), where various frequencies of noise lull you to sleep. We’ve also tested sleep gadgets pretty extensively to not only get us to sleep, but also maintain deep sleep.
And maybe melatonin is a different sort of band-aid over the reality of your sleep situation, meaning that your mattress may need to be replaced. We have plenty of mattresses we’ve tested for every kind of sleeper, along with the best sheets and pillows. Supplements may not be the answer, after all, but more of a sleep space upgrade—all things to consider!
Compare Our Picks
Others Tested
Courtesy of Sakara Life
Sakara Life; starts at $141 per week; up to $465 for specialty programs: This plant-based, gluten-free meal kit reminds me of what most people think when they think of “crunchy” vegan food—raw vegetables with an earthy taste. Nearly all meals in Sakara’s lineup are uncooked and preprepared—items like veggie burgers are without buns, lasagnas are “deconstructed.” For example, a “Lavender Quesadilla” has broccoli pesto and cashew “cheese” with hibiscus salsa … you get the idea. The menu is curated each week, and meals come in single servings. Sakara also has health supplements (which can be scientifically dubious), like a metabolism booster and fulvic acid cell reset. Sakara’s signature nutrition program meal plan is designed to replace all meals and is delivered twice weekly. If you buy one week of five days, three meals a day, it’s $465 per week; weekly subscriptions of five days, three meals a day, is $395 per week; prices go down to $141 per week with a 12-week subscription for three days at two meals per day. There’s also a “Level II: Detox” program, starting at $465 per week. This meal kit seems fit for Gwyneth Paltrow or WAGs (wife or girlfriend of professional athletes) everywhere, but it wasn’t the right fit for my budget and taste preferences.
NutriFit
NutriFit for $10 to $45 per meal: NutriFit is more like a personal chef than a meal-kit delivery service, specializing in nutrient-dense, fully prepared meals with a huge range of fare, with gluten- and dairy-free and vegetarian and vegan options. The company ships to the lower 48 states, and most meals hovered around $20. NutriFit has customized, chef-curated meal plans that are tailored for the eater and include specifics like health goals and dietary restrictions, where the customer can select their own meals on the Premium plan or have the curated meals from the 13-week rotating menu, starting at $19 per day. There are also à la carte options, which I tested, which range from $10 to $45 per meal. These don’t require a subscription or a minimum, and come in meals that serve three to four people or in individual size Fit for ONE meals that feed one, where you choose from “Always Available Favorites” and rotating new specials. A lentil chickpea salad, cold udon noodles, hearty roasted tomato soup, and crispy vegan tacos were standouts. But I wasn’t a huge fan of most of the chef-curated specials, and the food started to wilt or get mushy if not eaten within the first few days. The user interface of the service isn’t the best or easiest to navigate, either.
Photograph: Molly Higgins
Fresh! Meal Plan from $11 to $14 per meal: You can choose from 6, 10, or 14 meals per week, or order à la carte (which is a minimum of eight meals), ranging from $11 to $14 per meal, with the price lowering the more you order. It’s got choices for keto, paleo, high-protein, dairy- and gluten-free, and vegan and vegetarian meals, and everything is preprepared and just needs to be microwaved (or air fried) for about three minutes. There were six vegan meals and four vegetarian meals at the time of writing, with a menu filter to easily see choices. The vegetarian coconut chia breakfast pudding and margherita breakfast pizza were standouts, the vegan crab cakes had a mushy consistency and almost cinnamon-like flavor, and the vegan blackened “chickn” and Cajun pasta was rubbery and lacked spice. Since testing several months ago, none of the plant-based meal choices has changed, so this may be best as a supplemental meal kit for plant-based eaters.
Not Recommended
Photograph: Molly Higgins
Eat Clean for $9 to $13 per meal: This vegan meal delivery service would be best for someone who loves the taste and convenience of TV dinners. Eat Clean has a dozen plant-based heat-’n’-eat meals available, with availability to order six to 20 meals per week, ranging from six meals for $13 each to 20 meals at $9 each. Each meal comes in a plastic container and needs to be microwaved or heated for around three minutes. Many of the meals have very similar flavors—the tomato sauce base for the chili, spaghetti, and lasagna all tasted the same. The meals with sides often felt random: zucchini with mac and cheese and nuggets; a cornbread on the side of chili that tasted exactly like a cinnamon coffee cake (the flavors didn’t go well together on that one). Like TV dinners, flavors were often one-note, and I opted to air fry to enhance mushy textures. This meal kit is nearly the same price as most I’ve tested, and the picks above are a whole lot tastier.
Are Meal Kit Services Worth It?
The answer really depends on what you value, whether that’s time, convenience, cost, or something else altogether, like finding new recipes or eating healthier. For me as a vegan, I find it a bit harder to find new recipes or where I can find the ingredients needed when I do find them. Cheaper meal-kit service plans hover around $13 per serving, with more expensive plans like Sakara at $400 for a full week of meals. For the cheaper meal plans like Green Chef at $12 with generous portions, the meal prices seem comparable to the cost of buying plant-based (often organic) groceries. WIRED reviewer Matthew Korfhage did a deep dive to find out: Are Meal Kits Cheaper Than Groceries in 2025? and the results surprised me.
I ate and prepared at least three days’ worth of meals or four meals minimum from each brand over the course of a week. If the brand had both frozen, microwavable meals and meal kits that needed to be prepared, I tested both. When I could, I let the brand curate the meals for me, going with what the algorithm chose rather than personal taste to get an unbiased look at the choices offered.
For plant-based meal kits, I prepared them as indicated in the directions and didn’t add any extra food items or seasoning, so I could taste them exactly as they were meant to be.
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