• The ban targets access, not the system producing the harm. Systems will continue to amplify content optimised for engagement for every user the ban does not reach.
• The Online Safety Act addresses risk but not incentives. Even where platforms comply with the Act and the ban, the business model that profits from harmful amplification remains intact.
• A Digital Harm Levy would close the gap. A tax calibrated to a Harmful Content Exposure Rate would make safer platform design economically rational, complementing the ban and the Act rather than replacing them.

The harm is engineered

Recommender systems decide which feeds a message enters, how prominently it appears, who sees it, and whether to push it further if early engagement is strong. None of these choices are forced by the content. They are the work of systems whose function is engagement, written into code and tuned on past data.

This matters because engagement and harm are correlated. Material that provokes outrage, fear, contempt, or in-group hostility tends to hold attention. Systems optimised for attention therefore amplify some kinds of speech more than others—at scale, repeatedly, and in personalised ways that compound over time.

The evidence is now substantial. The Internet Watch Foundation has documented a 26,362% year-on-year increase in photorealistic AI-generated child sexual abuse material. Despite age restrictions, an estimated 72% of children aged 8 to 12 bypass safety controls to access adult-tier platforms, where recommender systems routinely surface content on self-harm and disordered eating. Civil verdicts in the United States, including the Meta proceedings in New Mexico and the K.G.M. trial in Los Angeles, have begun to treat platform design itself as the proximate cause of harm to minors.

What the Ban does, and does not, do

The under-16 ban is the right response to part of the problem. Children are particularly vulnerable to engagement-driven amplification, and the evidence supporting protective intervention is strong. But the ban faces three limitations the policy debate should engage with directly.

First, enforcement. The same 72% bypass rate that justifies the ban also predicts its partial failure. Children who want access will find it through VPNs, family accounts, and the well-documented permeability of age-assurance systems. The eSafety Commissioner’s first compliance report found that “roughly 70% of children who had accounts before the ban retained access to at least one platform three months later, with no discernible reduction in cyberbullying or image-based abuse complaints from under-16 users.” Bypass rates thus remain high under enforcement. A ban that does not reach its target audience cannot eliminate the harm; it can move it to spaces where it is less visible.

Second, scope. The ban applies to children. It does not apply to the adults and older teenagers whom engagement-driven systems also harm, e.g., through coordinated harassment, ideological radicalisation, addictive use, and informational distortion.

Third, and most fundamentally, the incentive gap. The ban changes who can access social media. It does not change what social media is incentivised to do. Platforms will continue to operate the same recommender systems for every user the ban does not reach. Even where they fully comply with the ban and the Online Safety Act, the financial incentive to amplify harmful content remains intact, right up to the legal line.

These are not arguments against the ban. They are arguments for what must accompany it.

A Digital Harm Levy

Research at The University of Manchester proposes a Digital Harm Levy: a progressive tax on platforms calibrated to the rate at which their systems deliver harmful content to users—the Harmful Content Exposure Rate (HCER).

The HCER is the proportion of total user impressions on a platform that fall within harm categories defined by Ofcom. It measures what recommender systems actually deliver, not whether any particular item should be removed. A platform that reduces its HCER pays less. A platform that increases it pays more. The tax targets what economists call negative externalities, that is, the social cost the platform’s systems impose on third parties.

The levy is designed to complement the under-16 ban and the Online Safety Act, not replace them. Where the ban addresses access and the Act addresses specified harm categories, the levy addresses the residual externality through a continuous price. The three instruments do work the others cannot.

Crucially, the levy does not require platforms to remove content. To reduce their HCER, platforms can downrank harmful material, slow the spread of borderline content, redesign recommender systems, or invest in better user controls. The apt metaphor is throttling, not censorship.

Policy actions – and implementation

• Legislate a Digital Harm Levy alongside the under-16 ban. Introduce a progressive tax on digital platforms based on their Harmful Content Exposure Rate, targeting the systemic amplification of lawful-but-harmful content for all users.
• Build the auditing infrastructure. Mandate Ofcom to define auditable harm categories and work with standards bodies like the British Standards Institution and the Financial Reporting Council, to establish a methodology by which independent auditors can calculate the HCER from anonymised platform data.
• Phase implementation. Roll out the levy in three stages: definition of audit standards, a twelve-month pilot during which platforms report HCER data without financial penalty, and full enforcement integrated into the existing Digital Services Tax.

The ban makes certain online harms unreachable for children. A Digital Harm Levy would make them unprofitable for platforms. Speech would remain permitted and amplification ceases to be costless.

• A significant proportion of the estimated 215 billion items of flexible plastic packaging annually placed on the UK market will be collected and sorted for recycling by 2027.
• The UK remains ill-prepared to recycle flexible plastic packaging.
• There is an urgent need for a stronger strategic approach that prioritises the production and uptake of recycled feedstocks, halting the loss of infrastructural capacity and upscaling capabilities that makes sustainability pay.

The need for a stronger strategic approach

The collection, sorting and recycling of flexible plastic packaging across the UK has never been done before. Simpler Recycling thus presents an unprecedented challenge, which needs to be taken on as part of circular economy and net zero transitions.

Worryingly, however, rather than seeing an increase in recycling capacity, in line with the rollout of Simpler Recycling and other UK and EU policies that are driving higher demand for recycled feedstocks, the general trend is decline. In the UK, for example, more than 200,000 tonnes of plastic reprocessing capacity have disappeared since 2024. As a result, just when capacity is needed most, it is disappearing.

The loss of capacity is symptomatic of a wider lack of strategic thinking and planning concerning flexible plastic packaging recycling. The UK’s Modern Industrial Strategy, published in November 2025, says little to nothing specific on plastic packaging and plastics recycling. The publication of The Circular Economy Growth Plan has, moreover, been delayed. Whether this or other initiatives, including the recently launched All-Party Parliamentary Group on Sustainable Plastics, will deliver much-needed strategic clarity remains unclear.

What is clear is that the UK is in urgent need of a detailed and comprehensive strategy for UK flexible plastic packaging recycling.

Making sustainable end markets for flexible plastic packaging a reality

A multi-stakeholder impact and engagement research initiative, supported by the University of Manchester’s Sustainable Consumption Institute (SCI) and Henry Royce Institute, focused on what is needed to make sustainable end markets for UK flexible plastic packaging. Despite a diversity of voices in attendance from across the value chain, there was a surprising degree of agreement on the urgent need for a stronger strategic approach, focusing on three key priorities.

Priority 1: Favour the production and use of recycled feedstocks

Favouring the production and use of recycled feedstocks over virgin, fossil-fuel-based derivatives is a key priority. Firstly, this will give the recycling industry a much-needed boost. Secondly, it will help bring about sustainable end markets for recycled content. Over the shorter term, there is a strong justification to accept that it is better to get recycled content into a fuller range of commodities, which may not represent closed loop cycles (i.e., food-grade-to-food-grade packaging), than it is to see flexibles hit incinerators, landfill or export. This acceptance needs to be caveated with the longer-term strategic goal of getting recycled materials into closed-loop cycles based on the momentum of short-term shifts.

Priority 2: Stop the loss of recycling capacity and scale up capabilities

Stopping the contraction in UK recycling capacity and scaling up capabilities is another priority. This is crucial to the delivery of Priority 1 and therefore to making sure that recycled feedstocks are available to feed into a fuller range of commodities and end markets. The infrastructural scale up required needs to prioritise the national coordination of collection, sorting and reprocessing infrastructures. A strategically oriented, time-sensitive approach to the balance between mechanical and chemical recycling pathways needs to dovetail with this to maximise the potentials of flexibles recycling.

Priority 3: Make sustainability pay   

Making sure that it pays to recycle flexible plastic packaging is another strategic priority. This is key to Priority 2 and achieving the upscaling and coordination of UK recycling infrastructure required to deliver Priority 1 and therefore to producing recyclate (materials made from waste) needed to replace the use of virgin, fossil-fuel feedstocks. For too long, financial costs have proven prohibitive to socially, environmentally and economically sustainable investment in UK plastics recycling.

No time to waste – suggested policy pathways

The combination of UK waste policy, including Simpler Recycling, Extended Producer Responsibility (EPR)

and the Plastic Packaging Tax (PPT), does not add up to a holistic strategic approach to flexible plastic packaging recycling. Such an approach is urgently needed to make sure that flexible plastic packaging that is set to be collected and sorted at scale for recycling is recycled.

As part of prioritising the fuller use of recycled content, to gain some much-needed industry momentum, a more ambitious approach to the use of recyclate and adherence to design for recyclability is recommended, following or even going further than that being pursued by the EU’s 2030 Packaging and Packaging Waste Regulation (PPWR).

To get fuller use of recycled content, renewed investment in the recycling industry and infrastructure is needed. It is recommended, in turn, that the £250-plus million generated through the PPT and a proportion of the £1.5 billion forecast to come with EPR be ring-fenced for such purposes. This approach needs to see spending spread and targeted to where it is needed most, not simply aimed at local collection and sorting, as per the current design of EPR. This spending spread could usefully see the use of low interest loans or subsidies for recycling plant investments or sector innovation and scale-up.

The use of low-interest loans or subsidies complements a third and final recommendation, which is to make sustainability pay. Policy further needs to address, in this regard, high operating costs, the challenges of competing with cheaper imports, and the more economically lucrative allure of exporting plastic waste, all of which dampen risk appetite for domestic investment.

If a greater strategic approach to flexible plastic packaging recycling does not materialise quickly, the UK looks set to disappoint on the promise of Simpler Recycling and related commitments to circular economy and net zero.

• By 2050 it is projected that summer rainfall is likely to drop by approximately 15% and summer river flows by roughly 45%, making droughts more frequent and severe.
• Recent droughts have caused significant losses to arable yields, with direct costs to UK food producers running into hundreds of millions of pounds.
• The Clean Water Bill (the Bill) must prioritise agriculture as a key part of our water system and economy by placing an explicit statutory duty on the regulator to ensure drought resilience and preparedness, with food security embedded as a key criterion.

Impacts of drought on UK agriculture and food security

The White Paper rightly acknowledges that England’s ageing water infrastructure is “struggling to cope”. However, there is little to no discussion about how drought affects, and will increasingly compromise, the capacity of England’s agricultural sector to produce food and ensure supply chain resilience.

By 2050 it is projected that  summer rainfall is likely to drop by approximately 15% and summer river flows by roughly 45%. Coupled with increasing volatility of rainfall and heatwaves, this will make droughts far more frequent and severe. In 2025, many regions entered winter with continuing drought conditions, with a continued dry spring meaning many farmers in the south and east of England are likely to face significant production challenges in the summer ahead at the same time as Peers in the House of Lords highlight an urgent need for the greater drought preparedness.

The agricultural consequences of these trends are already being felt. Our research shows to maintain current production levels, food processing infrastructure in eastern England may need to relocate northwards within the next decade, due to escalating drought pressures. Droughts in 2022 and subsequent years caused significant losses to arable yields, with direct costs to UK food producers running into hundreds of millions of pounds in 2025. Yet England’s regulatory framework offers farmers few options for adapting and responding to water scarcity: no tradeable water rights, no drought contingency allocation, and no financial safety net.

Where the White Paper falls short

The White Paper’s proposals have potential to deliver significant structural improvements in water management and policy in the UK. However, reforms fail to address several critical challenges related to how water is managed and governed within the agricultural sector.

Water rights

Our abstraction licensing system is over 50 years old with catchments across eastern and southern England – the most water scarce parts of the country – already chronically over-licensed or over-abstracted. The White Paper proposes moving abstraction regulation into the Environmental Permitting Regulations but says little about modernising the underlying allocation framework. Australia’s Murray-Darling Basin Authority operates a system of tradeable water entitlements with dynamic seasonal allocations that flex according to real-time storage and catchment conditions; several US states have introduced innovative tradable multi-year permit schemes that allow farmers flexibility to adapt and share water during times of scarcity. Our research demonstrates that flexible allocation systems substantially reduce economic and environmental costs of scarcity. Without comparable reforms, we cannot credibly claim to be building a climate resilient water system.

Monitoring

The White Paper has limited ambition when it comes to monitoring of water use, even though it is widely acknowledged that you cannot effectively manage what you don’t measure. For most abstraction licences, actual water use is rarely measured in real-time, and, within the agricultural sector, there is a significant reliance on self-reporting. Evidence shows that a lack of monitoring is a critical barrier to ensuring compliance and enforcement of water rights, particularly as pressures on scarce water supplies intensify. Our work on satellite-based monitoring shows that affordable, scalable technologies exist, with regulators and water managers in North America and southern Europe already using them to track agricultural water use and support efficient on-farm water management. Policymakers should be investing in such capabilities today, working in partnership with the farming sector, to ensure it is able to respond effectively to emerging water scarcity risks.

Framing

The White Paper rightly identifies agriculture as responsible for around 40% of river and groundwater pollution and commits to stronger enforcement of existing rules. This framing reduces farming entirely to a regulatory problem rather than a productive system that underpins national food security and is acutely vulnerable to water shortages. This matters for enforcement as well as resilience: water rights that cannot be practically exercised during drought create perverse incentives for illegal abstraction, undermining the very compliance framework the White Paper seeks to strengthen. The UK needs a firmer approach to enforcement of water rights with genuine financial and technical support for farmers to adapt and to mitigate risks posed by increasingly volatile and uncertain water supplies.

Water storage

The White Paper’s commitment to nine new reservoirs is welcome, but it reflects an approach that concentrates investment in centralised assets serving public water systems. This approach does not adequately address agricultural drought, which demands a complementary portfolio of distributed storage solutions, including on-farm storage, that can buffer irrigation demand against summer drought risks and reduce pressure on rivers and aquifers. Equally important, but entirely absent from the White Paper, is any framework for water sharing between farms and across catchments. Where individual holdings lack the land or capital for storage, collective infrastructure – shared reservoirs, irrigation districts, and water co-operatives – has proved effective in comparable agricultural systems in France, Spain, and Australia.

Recommendations

The Bill should give the new water regulator an explicit statutory objective to ensure drought resilience and preparedness, with food security and rural economic resilience embedded as a key criterion when evaluating and designing new systems of management and governance. Without this, water for farming will remain an afterthought in regulatory decision-making, leaving farmers and the UK’s food supply system critically exposed to drought and water scarcity.

The Bill should include provisions to fundamentally reform water rights and abstraction licensing. Dynamic seasonal allocations tied to real-time catchment conditions, transparent licence curtailment mechanisms for drought periods, and a framework for temporary water trading between agricultural users should be introduced. This could be supported by innovations in monitoring of water use and availability enabled by satellite remote sensing and other digital sensing technologies. This is the single most important structural reform the Bill could deliver for food security and farm sustainability.

Policymakers must pursue a comprehensive programme of water risk management and transfer for the agricultural sector – including regulatory support for distributed water storage and financial mechanisms such as index-based insurance and targeted grants for on-farm storage investment. These changes should be designed in tandem with a reformed abstraction licensing framework, with monitoring systems in place to ensure that seasonal and flexible abstraction rights are clearly defined and enforceable.

The government’s ambition for water reform is genuine and substantial. But a vision for water that treats agriculture as a pollution problem rather than a critical part of the food production system and rural economies risks building a regulatory architecture that is unprepared for the water challenges we will face in the coming decades. The Bill must prioritise agriculture as a key part of our water system and economy, without which food security and economic growth will suffer.

• The NERC Digital Solutions Hub (DSH) stands at the forefront of this data-led transformation.
• Central to this endeavour is the use of data: not just as a passive resource, but as an active driver of insight, accountability and innovation.
• By leveraging the power of spatial data and Geographic Information Systems (GIS), the DSH provides a suite of tools and methodologies to support robust decision making, tackle environmental challenges and maximise the value of NERC’s and other UK data assets.

The Centrality of Data in Modern Decision Making 

The scope and scale of data available to contemporary decision makers has grown exponentially. Data now flows from a multitude of sources: satellites circling the Earth, sensors in urban infrastructure, user-generated content, and vast repositories of government and academic research. This wealth of information presents enormous opportunities, but only when harnessed effectively.  Sound decision making requires not just access to data, but the means to interpret it, integrate it with other evidence and apply it to real- world contexts.

Here, the DSH’s approach is instructive. By focusing on the collection, curation, and analysis of spatial data, it ensures that decisions are grounded in a detailed understanding of place, context, and change.

Driving Innovation 

The DSH is a flagship initiative of the Natural Environment Research Council, designed to transform the UK’s ability to generate, share, and apply environmental data. The programme’s objectives are ambitious: to break down barriers to data access, foster cross-sector collaboration, and unleash the potential of digital technologies in addressing key environmental and social challenges.

Among its primary contributions is the promotion of spatial data infrastructures, which bring together diverse datasets and make them available through intuitive, interoperable platforms. This has profound implications for decision making; empowering policymakers, planners, and researchers with the timely, high-quality evidence they need.

Enabling Evidence-Based Policy 

One of the most significant impacts of the programme is its ability to underpin evidence-based policy. Through the integration of spatial data and GIS, decision makers gain access to a rich tapestry of information on land use, biodiversity, climate change, human health, population dynamics and more. This enables the identification of trends, risks, and opportunities that might otherwise remain hidden.

For example, spatial data can illuminate patterns of urban expansion, highlight areas of environmental vulnerability, or support the targeting of resources to communities most in need. The capacity to visualise and map these factors, often in real time, greatly enhances the effectiveness of policy interventions.

Supporting Cross-Sector Collaboration 

The challenges facing society, from climate change to housing provision, cannot be solved by any one sector alone. The DSH recognises this, fostering collaboration and knowledge exchange across government, academia, industry, and civil society. By providing shared access to spatial data and digital tools, it helps break down traditional silos and enables collective action.

Notably, the programme has supported a range of demonstration projects where data-driven decision making has delivered tangible benefits. These include urban flood mapping, climate change impacts on housing and communities, air pollution impacts on human health, habitat restoration planning, and infrastructure development, each underpinned by robust spatial analysis and stakeholder engagement.

The Power of Spatial Data, GIS and Mapping 

Spatial data, information about the location, shape, and relationships between physical features, lies at the heart of efforts to understand and manage complex systems. When combined with the analytical and visual capabilities of GIS, it becomes a transformative asset for decision support.

GIS enables users to layer multiple datasets, revealing how different factors interact across space and time. For instance, environmental managers can overlay maps of soil type, land cover and rainfall to assess flood risk, while public health officials can combine demographic and pollution data to identify at-risk populations. Such integrative analysis is crucial for holistic, system-wide decision making.

Scenario Planning and Forecasting 

Beyond describing the present, spatial data and GIS are invaluable for exploring possible futures. Decision makers can build scenarios, testing how different policies, investments, or events might shape outcomes, and use these insights to plan for resilience and sustainability. The DSH provides the data infrastructure and insight needed to support such forward-looking approaches.

Spatial Data in Action 

Consider the challenge of managing urban green spaces. Local authorities must balance competing demands for recreation, biodiversity, urban cooling, and new housing, often with limited resources. Through the DSH, councils can access up-to-date spatial datasets on land cover, public accessibility, and ecological value.

Using GIS, planners can map current provision, identify gaps, and model the impacts of proposed developments. This empowers them to make defensible, evidence-led decisions that reflect both community needs and long-term sustainability goals.

Challenges and Future Directions 

While the potential of data-driven decision making is immense, it is not without challenges. Data quality, interoperability, and metadata are critical to ensuring that data delivers public value. Poor or inconsistent metadata remains a major barrier to data discovery, reuse, and integration, even where datasets comply with established standards such as the UK Government Data Standards and the INSPIRE Regulations. The DSH is addressing this gap by building capability and promoting clearer, more consistent, and machine-readable metadata aligned with standards and applying the FAIR principles. Strengthening metadata quality, particularly around provenance, update frequency, uncertainty, and fitness for purpose would significantly enhance interoperability and support more effective, evidence-based decision-making across government.

Going forward, there is an urgent need to democratise access to spatial data and GIS tools so that communities, businesses, and policymakers can meaningfully participate in the data revolution. This requires coordinated action at national level, particularly from The Department for Science, Innovation and Technology for data standards, digital skills and infrastructure and The Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs for environmental data and public-sector geospatial assets, working with NERC and devolved and local government to reduce barriers to access and use. Targeted investment is needed in applied spatial data training, including core data literacy, metadata and data stewardship skills, and practical GIS and analytics capabilities for non-specialists across the public and third sectors. International examples such as national geospatial knowledge hubs and open geospatial communities (e.g. cross-sector geospatial networks in the Netherlands and Finland) demonstrate the value of sustained collaboration between government, academia, industry and civil society through online communities, regular practitioner forums and joint innovation programmes. The DSH contributes to this agenda by providing open platforms, shared tools, and collaborative networks that support skills development, knowledge exchange, and co-production between data providers and users, helping to translate spatial data into more inclusive and effective decision-making.

Conclusion 

The role of data in supporting decision making has never been more critical. Through initiatives like the DSH, the UK is laying the foundations for a more informed, agile, and resilient society. By harnessing the unique power of spatial data and GIS, we can better understand the world around us, anticipate future needs, and deliver policies and actions that are both effective and equitable.

As we look to the future, continued investment in data infrastructure, capacity building, and innovation will be essential. By doing so, we can ensure that data fulfils its promise as a driver of positive change across the environment, health, economy, and society.

• Research findings suggest that direct-to-consumer genetic (DNA) testing fundamentally alters the landscape of donor conception.
• Regulation should consider greater flexibility in donor conception arrangements and the importance of wider donor kinship networks.
• There is a shortfall in counselling provision for those involved in donor conception and legislation and policy in the UK should be updated to strengthen support structures.

Direct-to-Consumer genetic testing has changed the landscape fundamentally

Perhaps the most urgent issue is one that the original legislative framework could not have anticipated: the rise of direct-to-consumer genetic testing (DTCGT). Services such as 23andMe have made it possible for anyone (donor-conceived people, donors, and wider relatives) to discover genetic connections outside of the official register run by the Human Fertilisation and Embryology Authority (HFEA).

The ConnecteDNA project, drawing on interviews with 101 donors, donor-conceived people and recipient parents, has documented the profound implications of this shift.

Donor-conceived people are discovering their ‘donor’ connections earlier than the law intended. The law that states that donor-conceived people can only access identifying information about their donor at age eighteen and this is being routinely bypassed by DTCGT. This does not necessarily mean the official system should be abandoned, but it does mean that current regulation urgently needs to be revisited.

Donors are being contacted by genetic relatives they did not know about or are matched with donor offspring who have not yet been told that they are donor conceived. This places people in a difficult position; donor conceived people may have knowledge that someone is donor conceived when that person does not know themselves, or donors might be contacted by donor offspring whilst not having told their own family that they were a donor. The emotional burden this can place on donor conceived people, donors and their families can be considerable and is largely unacknowledged.

Regulation needs to consider the implications of DTCGT and what support people need to manage these new connections.

Known donation deserves greater policy attention

The Curious Connections research, comprised of 88 interviews, maps the personal life impact of being a donor in the UK.

It showed that many donors experience a strong sense of affinity with their recipients. Egg donors, in particular, can feel connected with the mothers of donor-conceived children, even when they had never met.

For some donors, this led them to seek out ‘open’ or known donor arrangements, where they had an ongoing relationship with the recipient family. Interviews with both egg and sperm donors indicate that current models of identity-release donation do not work for everyone and rates of known donation are increasing. Hence, our research suggests that it is timely and important to consider regulatory changes that allow for more flexibility in terms of donor conception arrangements.

The wider family must be recognised

Our research consistently points to something that current policy largely overlooks: donation does not only affect donors and donor-conceived people. It affects the donors and donor conceived people’s own children, parents, and partners, and extended family, who may develop their own feelings of connection with those related to them through donor conception.

We recommend that legislation explicitly recognise this wider network of relationships. Practical measures could include opening the HFEA’s existing Donor Sibling Link, (which allows children conceived using the same donor, to apply to connect after they turn 18) to the raised children of donors and ensuring that counselling provision acknowledges the complexity of these extended family dynamics.

Counselling must be long-term and funded

Across our research, one finding recurs: the need for high-quality, long-term counselling provision. Implications counselling is currently a requirement of the donation process for donors and recipient parents, but our research suggests this provision is uneven and insufficiently sustained.

Donation is not a one-off event. A donor may find that the anticipated contact from a donor-conceived person, or the lack of it, raises new questions. Their own children may develop curiosity about donor siblings. Their parents or wider family may feel themselves to be impacted. Donor-conceived people also require support –  our research demonstrates how the need for support can ebb and flow across the life course, for all those involved.

In sum, evidence shows that counselling should be freely available to all those impacted by donor conception. It should be clearly separated from the legal process of informed consent, so donors and recipient parents feel genuinely free to explore what donation means to them. Equally importantly, counselling must remain available post-donation, not just at the point of donation.

Calls for reform

The UK’s approach to gamete donation needs reform. The evidence gathered by our research programmes points clearly to areas where the current system is not keeping pace with the realities experienced by those it affects.

Regulatory attention to the impact of direct-to-consumer genetic testing; the growth of known donation; recognition of the implications for peoples’ wider family; and better funded, long-term counselling are all priorities that our research shows need further attention.

Acknowledgements: we would like to thank Leah Gilman and Caroline Redhead, the ConnecteDNA team and our research participants.

• Quantum technologies provide a huge opportunity for the UK, which could become a global leader in a market predicted to be worth over £90 billion in the next decade.
• The National Graphene Institute has discovered the world’s purest silicon, and now researchers are working to use these pure samples as prototype quantum computers.
• To secure the UK’s place as a future quantum superpower, the government must continue to invest in: R&D, training, commercialisation of innovation, and in building and maintaining infrastructure.

Quantum technologies today 

Quantum physics is already key for our everyday technologies. Innovations such as semiconductor chips, which are essential for our phones and computers, are built upon quantum effects. Such technologies underpin our present ‘information age’ and we are now seeing the emergence of a new generation of technologies going beyond these, where the nature of the ‘information’ itself obeys the laws of quantum physics, often referred to as Quantum 2.0. 

Quantum technologies maximise the use of quantum effects in information processing to harness tremendous advantages, offering enhanced sensing and imaging, secure communications, novel materials, new tests of fundamental physics, and a profoundly novel and efficient form of computation. The potential applications span across the sciences and beyond, presenting both fantastic opportunities –  including greater medical diagnostic power and accelerated pharmaceutical drug discovery –  alongside immense risks and implications for national security, such as robust navigation, unbreakable encryption for secure communication, and faster decryption for codebreaking purposes. 

From the outset, the UK has been at the front of quantum technologies research. From the inception of quantum, scientists based in the UK have made many of the groundbreaking discoveries at the heart of the field. The Government established the National Quantum Technologies Programme (NQTP) in 2013, which supports valuable innovation and commercial initiatives such as the national ‘Quantum Hubs’ and the National Quantum Computing Centre. Published in 2023, the UK now has a National Quantum Strategy with five key missions. UK researchers remain at the forefront of quantum technologies research, and the UK is home to a vast number of quantum technologies start-ups. 

At present, we are seeing the realisation of proof-of-concept devices, from sensing to computing, and are now on the cusp of practical applications of some of these technologies. Beyond research capabilities and dedicated start-ups, we are now seeing significant investment from venture capitalists and major players in the technology industry, such as Google and Microsoft. Yet, there remain many obstacles to overcome before the full potential and benefits of quantum technologies are realised, from fundamental algorithmic design, through significant engineering challenges, to ensuring a capable quantum workforce.

Quantum at The University of Manchester 

From the breakthrough discovery of Graphene in 2010, to the establishment of the National Graphene Institute (NGI), The University of Manchester continues to boast a strong pedigree in 2D materials research. Research from The University of Manchester has discovered the world’s purest silicon; such freedom from impurities provides an excellent platform for engineering qubits, the fundamental building blocks of quantum computers. A major focus of ongoing research is in scaling up this purification process and furthering the use of these samples as prototype quantum computers. 

Systems theory – that is, how we model the interactions between a system and its surroundings – is a further strength. Not only can this help us in the design of viable hardware for quantum technologies, but it also gives us a clearer picture of the noise effects that plague and limit the capabilities of current quantum computers. With more sophisticated models of this noise, we can learn both how to mitigate against it and how to harness it for beneficial applications in complex systems modelling, such as weather, climate, and traffic. 

Research from The University of Manchester is also exploring how photons – the elementary unit of light – can be used to create and probe quantum phenomena. Hosted at the Photon Science Institute, these experiments build tools to generate, control and detect light down to the single photon level, and use light to control matter for the development of quantum sensors and observe microscopic processes at extreme length and time scales. 

The establishment of the new Centre for Quantum Science and Engineering (CQSE) at The University of Manchester aims to ensure that quantum research strengths work to boost synergistic connections, furthering our status as a prime venue for quantum research, attracting and training key talent in the field, and placing us in a leading role in bringing forth the new quantum technological frontier. 

Securing UK quantum leadership  

The proposed benefits of quantum technologies have been predicted to stimulate a global market in excess of tens of billions GBP, with the economic benefits of quantum computing alone in the region of £1 trillion. Present investment in the field, though substantial, still pales in comparison to these numbers. With the UK now on the brink of practical quantum advantages – particularly in terms of timekeeping, imaging, and sensing – there remain theoretical and engineering challenges to realising the full potential of quantum technologies, and their powerful applications. Like the industrial revolution, the quantum revolution will not be a singular point, but a constant period of rapid innovation and development. To ensure continued UK quantum leadership throughout, we must continue to invest in advancing cutting-edge quantum research and development (R&D). 

The UK needs a quantum-ready workforce, not just for developing future quantum technologies, but also to ensure these are used to their full potential in practice. This means building an effective training pipeline, not just for quantum scientists, but also for end users of quantum technologies more broadly. Quantum as a field is all too often presented as mysterious and incomprehensible for non-experts, creating a perceived high entry barrier. To combat this, support is needed for the development of training programmes designed to demystify and simplify quantum technologies for non-scientists, and the introduction of quantum modules into digital technologies upskilling programmes. Such training will create the necessary quantum-literate workers for the UK to be a leading quantum era economy. 

The UK National Quantum Technologies Progamme (NQTP) is a £1 billion dynamic collaboration between industry, academia and government. The NQTP supports five quantum hubs, each championing key domains within quantum technologies – such as quantum computing (QCI3) and sensing and imaging (QuSIT) – acting as beacons for their respective areas. To further the impact of the programme, regional quantum hubs should be created to focus on initiatives that cross quantum specialisations and combine the breadth of expertise from the domain-based hubs, supporting local research networks to pool expertise and resources. The N8 group of Northern universities currently runs semi-annual ‘Northern Quantum Meetings’ for research dissemination and collaboration formation, and agreements exist between these universities for quantum technologies research infrastructure. New regional cross-quantum hubs should be established, building on this blueprint, and should bring in key players in the Northern quantum industry, such as IBM Quantum and PsiQuantum in Daresbury and Aegiq in Sheffield. In line with both missions set out in the NQTP, and plans for economic and regional growth as laid out by the Starmer Government, the Department for Science, Innovation and Technology (DSIT) should work collaboratively with the Government Communications Headquarters (GCHQ) to establish a Northern Quantum Powerhouse Hub to further unify, co-ordinate, and grow such activities to solidify the North – and the UK’s – quantum leadership. 

The UK’s Quantum Missions set out an ambitious vision for UK quantum leadership. Realised, this will place the UK as one of the world’s future quantum superpowers, but this requires continued investment: in R&D, people and training, commercialisation of innovation, and in building and maintaining infrastructure.  

With the necessary investment and approach, the UK has the potential to become a leading nation of the forthcoming quantum revolution, capturing great benefits for society, industry, and national security. 

• The staggered rollout of UC between 2013 and 2018 is associated with worsening population mental health and higher mental health-related healthcare use.
• By 2018, this equated to around 113,000 additional cases of depression, 30,000 extra mental health-related hospital admissions and attendances, and 1.29 million more antidepressant prescriptions each year, with combined annual costs of £2.84 billion.
• Proposed reforms to welfare spending must consider the wider health impact, with provisions to mitigate and avoid replicating the effects of UC.

Universal Credit (UC) was introduced to simplify the benefits system and strengthen work incentives. It replaced six means-tested benefits with a single monthly payment, alongside a digital-first application process, a minimum five-week wait for the first payment, and a unified system of work-search requirements. It now supports over 7.5 million people, more than 18% of the UK’s working-age population.

Yet welfare design is not only about employment and public spending. It also shapes health. The level, timing and conditions of financial support influence income security, stress, and people’s ability to manage work and daily life. Simplification and clearer work incentives can support employment, and good work is often good for health. But where support creates instability or financial strain, it can have the opposite effect. Welfare policy therefore has direct implications for demand on NHS services.

Our research links the rollout of UC across England to worsening population mental health and rising mental health-related use of NHS services. This matters now. The Government’s Get Britain Working agenda aims to reduce economic inactivity, and reshape employment support and health-related benefits. But if welfare delivery increases stress and mental ill-health, it risks weakening progress on employment while adding avoidable pressure to the NHS.

How did UC rollout affect mental health?

The staggered rollout of UC across England from 2013 to 2018 meant different areas were exposed at different times. This allowed us to compare outcomes before and after UC was introduced in each area.

Using national small-area administrative data, we tracked three outcomes: clinical diagnoses of depression, antidepressant prescribing, and mental health-related hospital admissions and attendances. Because the data cover entire neighbourhoods, the results capture population-wide impacts, including both direct effects on UC recipients and wider spillovers within households and communities.

We found that earlier exposure to UC was associated with worse mental health outcomes. At a national scale, by 2018, this translated to approximately:

• 113,742 additional depression cases per year.
• 29,993 additional mental health-related hospital admissions and attendances per year.
• 29 million additional antidepressant prescriptions per year.

Overall, the combined effects on healthcare and quality of life amounted to £2.84 billion in costs each year. These are not small side effects. They represent substantial downstream pressure on the NHS and significant costs borne by individuals, families and communities.

Why did this happen?

The patterns we observe are consistent with a simple pathway: financial strain and uncertainty increase the risk of mental ill-health, which in turn increases healthcare use and can make it harder to sustain employment.

Several design features of UC may contribute to this dynamic.

First, the start of a claim can be financially destabilising. A minimum five-week wait for the first payments, combined with deductions to repay advances can create sustained cash-flow pressures.

Second, administrative demands can create barriers. The digital-first claims process and complex evidence requirements may lead to delays, confusion and anxiety, particularly for people with limited digital access or literacy.

Third, UC formalised and intensified conditionality. With some exceptions under the Work Capability Assessment, claimants are expected to meet agreed work-search or work-preparation commitments, often for up to 35 hours per week, with the risk of sanctions if requirements are not met. While designed to encourage labour market participation, these expectations may be particularly difficult for people with fluctuating health conditions or emerging mental health problems who are not adequately supported.

These pressures may create a feedback loop. Policies intended to strengthen work incentives may, for some groups, increase stress and worsen mental health, making it harder to find and keep work.

This matters because mental ill-health carries large personal, social and economic costs. Long-term sickness is now a major driver of economic inactivity in the UK. If welfare design contributes to worsening mental health, it could widen existing health inequalities and work against wider policy goals on sustained employment and reduced pressure on NHS services.

Proposed reforms to health-related benefits further underscore the stakes. Recent modelling suggests that tightening eligibility for Personal Independence Payments could concentrate financial losses in more deprived constituencies and in areas with lower life expectancy. If reforms reduce support in places with the greatest health needs, there is a risk of widening inequalities and increasing demand on NHS services.

Policy implications: putting health at the centre of welfare reform

The Government’s reform agenda recognises the need to connect employment support with health support. Our findings highlight several considerations for policymakers as welfare reforms continue to evolve:

1. Reducing hardship at the start of a claim. Shortening or bridging the wait for the first payment, minimising avoidable delays, and reviewing deduction practices could reduce acute financial strain.
2. Conditionality may need to be carefully rebalanced for people at risk of poor health outcomes. Strengthening clinically informed safeguards and ensuring work-search expectations are realistic where mental health vulnerability exists may help reduce harm. The Pathways to Work model stresses flexible, tailored support for people with health conditions – adaptive conditionality is a key element of this.
3. Designing welfare systems for accessibility and dignity. Expanding supported non-digital routes and simplifying processes could reduce administrative stress for vulnerable claimants.
4. Integrating welfare and health support locally. Stronger links between welfare services and health support may help identify and assist people experiencing mental health difficulties earlier, particularly through local partnerships. This should build on the WorkWell initiative, connecting welfare services with social prescribers, counsellors, and mental healthcare providers.
5. Considering health impacts more systematically in welfare policy appraisal. Reforms are often evaluated primarily on employment and fiscal outcomes, but they can also have significant implications for population health and NHS use.

As Parliament considers reforms to health-related benefits and employment support, it is important that these wider system effects are considered. If financial losses are concentrated in more deprived, less healthy places, there is a real risk of increasing health inequalities and demand on already stretched NHS services.

A broader lesson

UC will remain central to the UK social security system and to any strategy to “Get Britain Working”. But welfare reform can carry a hidden health and healthcare bill.

If delivery choices increase stress and mental ill-health, the NHS will feel the consequences, and employment goals may become harder to achieve. Welfare policy is therefore labour market policy and public health policy at the same time, and recognising this connection is essential if we are to build a system that supports economic participation while protecting population wellbeing. The WorkWell initiative is a positive start, linking employment support with physical and mental health services for those living with illness or disabilities – but the same support must be made available for all welfare claimants. Work is widely recognised as a social determinant of health. Now policymakers must give the same recognition to the pathways to work.

• The current funding model for general practices in England includes a weighted component, based on registered patients’ age and gender, among other factors.
• However, this formula has not been updated since 2004, and was based on data from a small number of practices.
• A new formula uses richer, more recent data, combined with new weighting criteria, to more closely reflect the needs of patients.

General practices in England are funded through a mixed payment system. Around 60% of payments are based on the number of patients registered with a practice, weighted by their needs (weighted capitation). Other payments are based on the services delivered, either by volume, or by quality on a range of indicators, while additional payments support operations, such as for premises or IT.

The weighted capitation component is informed by the Global Sum formula (also known as the Carr-Hill formula), which seeks to predict practices’ workload through measures of population needs. It also adjusts for the costs of providing services in different locations, such as those with high prices, or rural areas. The formula has not been updated since 2004, and there are long-standing concerns that it does not adequately reflect current needs, particularly those of practices in more deprived areas.

The 10 Year Health Plan for England committed to a review of “how health need is reflected in nationally determined contracts”, including Carr-Hill. This review was launched in October 2025 and is currently ongoing.

An updated workload formula accounting for morbidity

A key element of Carr-Hill is the workload weights, estimated using patient data from under 5% of general practices in 2004. Workload was defined as appointment time with patients of different general practice professionals. It considered only age, gender, new registration, and whether the appointment took place at home or in a nursing home. A separate area-level adjustment was applied based on rates of long-standing illness and under-65 mortality in the local areas. Despite attempts to revise it and more recent formulae used for allocations, the formula used for practice payments has not been updated for over 20 years.

Our research at The University of Manchester proposes an updated, refined approach to calculate workload weights using more recent, nationally-representative patient-level data from electronic health records, which now cover over 20% of patients and general practices in England. Workload weights were generated based on patients’ age; gender; new registration; ethnicity; deprivation; and long-term conditions (LTCs), such as diabetes, asthma, or arthritis.

The use of richer data from electronic records allowed us to separate variations attributable to patients’ and practices’ characteristics, and to estimate workload driven by patients’ need characteristics. One advantage is that the updated measure of workload would be needs-based and not reflect differences in practice capacity and productivity.

We found estimated workload increases with age, deprivation, and for patients with LTCs. The inclusion of LTCs increases workload differentiation between patients, adding weight to younger patients in less deprived areas and older patients in more deprived areas. It also better reflects, on average, the higher needs of practices serving patients in more deprived areas.

Comparing updated to Carr-Hill workload weights

We obtained updated needs-based estimates of workload for each general practice in England, using weights from the updated formula and publicly available data on the number and characteristics of patients in each practice in 2024. For each practice we acquired a measure of “weighted-patient” – derived from the latest practice data and the updated weights – summarising the needs-based workload per average patient relative to the national average. The average payment per-patient per-year, excluding the cost-adjustment for differential input prices across different areas (also called Market Forces Factor, MFF), was £92.66, varying from £86.72 in the least deprived decile to £99.91 in the most deprived.

Weighting payments to account for different health needs leads to a slight reduction in these figures, ranging from £89.69 in the least deprived decile, to £96.40 in the most deprived. This suggests that current payments per-patient are relatively higher for practices serving patients in more deprived areas, even after adjusting for needs reflected in workload.

Carr-Hill weighted-patients were on average higher than the updated ones for practices serving patients in more deprived areas. This was likely driven by the separate area-level adjustments for long-standing illness and under-65 mortality. We attempted to isolate the workload component of Carr-Hill by removing the MFF component, though we could not remove the cost adjustment for rurality. The Carr-Hill weight on practices serving populations in more deprived areas was even higher after removing the MFF.

Comparisons of average weighted-patient by practice deprivation decile

Adapted from paper.

Aligning payments to updated workload weights

It is possible to uplift payments per weighted-patient to the level of better funded practices to rebalance the distribution without reducing payments for any of the practices. This would require additional funding. For example, it would require approximately £10 per-patient – or £678 million in total – to uplift payments to the level of the 10% best funded practices in 2023/24 (an increase of 11% in the total capitation payments in that year).

Average payment per-patient by practice deprivation decile under different uplift scenarios (2023/24)

Adapted from paper.

Policy implications

The core principle of needs-based capitation is the distribution of payments in proportion to patient need. The Carr-Hill formula is outdated and does not reflect needs accurately.

The workload weights of the general practice formula should be replaced with a version which can be routinely updated to reflect changing needs and accounts for a richer set of patient characteristics, ensuring that practices are better resourced for the populations they serve. Our updated estimates provide a more precise and differentiated measure, reflecting higher workload for practices serving patients with higher levels of morbidity and in more deprived areas. National primary care electronic records should be made accessible and used to continue routinely improving workload estimates.

Remaining concerns about under-funding of practices in deprived areas should be considered separately. For example, they could be addressed by adjustments to other elements of the formula, such as a re-evaluation of the MFF adjustment or separate adjustments to account for specific additional needs associated with deprivation. Moreover, if the objective was to increase resources for practices serving populations in more deprived areas, the distribution of the remaining non-capitation payments could also be re-considered. It is likely that any changes to the formula will require additional funding, because simply redistributing existing resources may lead to a reduction in care in some areas, and can be practically unfeasible.

A modern health system depends on funding models that can keep pace with the changing needs of its population. Our evidence shows Carr‑Hill no longer reflects the realities of morbidity, deprivation, and patient complexity across general practices. Using richer, nationally representative electronic health records offers a more accurate and equitable basis for allocating resources, particularly for practices serving communities with higher levels of long‑term conditions and deprivation. Yet an improved formula cannot, on its own, resolve persistent under‑funding in deprived areas; this will require parallel reconsideration of other components, as well as a willingness to invest additional resources where they are most needed. As the government’s review progresses, the adoption of an updated, data‑driven approach to workload estimation offers a critical opportunity: to ensure primary care funding aligns more closely with patient need, and ultimately to strengthen the fairness, sustainability, and effectiveness of general practice across England.

Statement of conflict of interest

This project was supported by the Health Foundation (FR-0006010). This project concluded prior to the launch of the government review into the GP funding formula in October 2025.

The views expressed are those of the authors and not necessarily the funders of the original or subsequent research.

The co-authors of this research, who also contributed to this article, are: Dr Shaolin Wang, Dr Yiu-Shing Lau, Dr Michael Anderson, Professor Evan Kontopantelis, and Professor Matt Sutton.

• Two women a week are killed in England and Wales by a current or ex male partner.
• Evidence shows that faith-based organisations (FBOs) can play a vital role in supporting women, particularly those from ethnic minority backgrounds.
• Policymakers should build on this by ensuring FBOs are integrated into domestic violence and abuse strategies and pathways.

Domestic violence and abuse (DVA) is a pervasive public health issue affecting over one-third of women globally. In the UK, ethnic minority women face unique and compounded barriers to disclosing abuse and accessing support services. These barriers can be compounded by immigration status. Despite policy advancements, these women often remain underserved due to systemic, cultural, and institutional challenges. Faith-based organisations (FBOs) and community networks emerge as pivotal, yet underutilised, support systems for all women, particularly for women from migrant and ethnic minority backgrounds who have a faith affiliation.

Barriers to disclosure

Research from The University of Manchester found that women with insecure immigration status or those dependent on their partners for residency are often deterred from seeking help due to fear of deportation, destitution, or losing custody of their children. This fear is exacerbated when both the victim and perpetrator are subject to immigration control.

Furthermore, socialisation from countries of birth and subsequent acculturation within the UK were also found to be significant barriers to domestic abuse disclosure among migrant and ethnic minority women, as gendered norms, expectations of family privacy, stigma, and mistrust of statutory systems are often reinforced rather than alleviated through the migration and settlement process.

The role of faith-based organisations

In the absence of extended family, women often form surrogate support networks through religious or community affiliations, which can be leveraged for intervention. Research at The University of Manchester shows that FBOs and community leaders are often the first point of contact for women experiencing abuse. These organisations provide culturally familiar and trusted spaces for disclosure.

New research with women from the Nigerian diaspora in the UK shows that FBOs can serve as both a resource, and a barrier in themselves. FBOs played a crucial role for women suffering DVA from an intimate partner, providing moral and spiritual support. For women who had moved from a collectivist culture in Nigeria to a largely individualistic one in the UK, FBOs and faith leaders were a source of trusted support and one of the first places women turned for help. However, this reliance on FBOs could sometimes constrain women’s ability to seek formal help, with moral counsel sometimes framed through the lens of religious teaching that maintaining a marriage was the most important priority – though other faith leaders advised that nobody should be compelled to stay in an abusive relationship.

Similarly, FBOs may lack the training or resources to respond effectively, and their involvement is not systematically integrated into statutory service frameworks. Faith leaders acknowledged their lack of awareness of existing DVA services, with one leader saying:

“If I know more about what social services and other organisations do, it will help lessen my own burdens in terms of knowing where to refer people to…”

Other leaders expressed a desire for more information and training around DVA to enhance their knowledge.

Policy implications and recommendations

During the COVID pandemic, FBOs were essential frontline services, often acting in partnership with local authorities to provide foodbanks and information-sharing networks. Local authorities and devolved mayoral authorities should now build on these spontaneous collaborations to integrate faith-based and community organisations into existing DVA response frameworks. FBOs and ethnic community groups need recognition from local and devolved government as frontline responders in DVA cases. Training, funding, and formal referral pathways should be provided to enable these organisations to support victims effectively.

The 2025 VAWG Strategy highlights the important role of the VCSE sector in shaping and delivering VAWG strategies – FBOs are an important part of this as trusted cultural institutions with a diversity of experiences. While in the longer-term an updated VAWG strategy should adopt an intersectional policy framework, in the short- to medium-term, it is vital that local policymakers recognise the compounded vulnerabilities faced by ethnic minority women and adapt interventions accordingly by building on what already works to help them access existing services.

The Ministry for Housing, Communities, and Local Government should set out parameters for working together between statutory/social services and FBOs. As part of this, local and combined authorities should develop local partnerships between statutory services and FBOs to build trust and improve service uptake. Cultural competency must be enhanced in statutory services, through mandatory cultural sensitivity and anti-discrimination training for frontline workers in police, healthcare, and social services. Community liaison officers or cultural mediators should be employed to bridge gaps between services and ethnic minority communities.

By acknowledging the central role of faith, community, and immigration dynamics, policymakers at all levels can design more inclusive, effective, and equitable interventions. Strengthening partnerships with FBOs, enhancing cultural competency, and removing systemic barriers are essential steps toward ensuring that all women – regardless of background – can access the support they need to live free from violence, while reducing the health inequalities gap by improving access to health and social care systems.

• Most software still relies on insecure foundations, making systems, infrastructure, and data increasingly exposed to cybersecurity threats and supply-chain attacks.
• Researchers at The University of Manchester are advancing software compartmentalisation by breaking applications into isolated components to contain attacks.
• Governments and industry should promote compartmentalisation through updated cybersecurity frameworks and training programs to help move security from reactive fixes to proactive, design-based solutions.

Today many aspects of our lives rely on computer systems, and recent breaches show that the level of cyber resilience is not where it needs to be. Strengthening cybersecurity is essential to protect economies and critical infrastructures, as well as personal and business data from evolving threats. In 2025, supply-chain attacks represent one of the fastest-growing cybersecurity threats: they proliferate because software is increasingly composed of diverse components with varying levels of security and trustworthiness. The widespread use of memory-unsafe programming languages is another prominent issue, resulting in a range of well-known and common coding errors that malicious actors routinely exploit. According to cybersecurity agencies from the UK, US, Canada, Australia and New Zealand, 70%+ of software still relies on memory-unsafe languages. Addressing these threats requires changes in common software engineering practices.

What is software compartmentalisation?

Software compartmentalisation is a defensive programming practice in which an application is broken down into isolated pieces (compartments) communicating through well-defined and secured channels. This differs from other protections by assuming that vulnerabilities are always a possibility: an attacker taking over part of the application through a vulnerability will be confined to the containing compartment, limiting the damage they can cause to the rest of the application. Compartmentalisation has proven its efficiency at containing many forms of attacks and is more relevant than ever in the context of increasing concerns about software supply chains attacks and memory safety. Although this practice has been known for over twenty years, it is currently only deployed in a handful of specific production software examples.

If it works, why hasn’t compartmentalisation reached the mainstream?

Research at The University of Manchester has found that the engineering costs required to implement or retrofit software compartmentalisation are too high. These costs, as well as the security benefits of compartmentalising, are also hard to predict and measure, discouraging prospective developers. Also, current approaches to compartmentalisation lack flexibility, due to the highly diverse security and performance requirements of modern hardware and software. Finally, significant challenges lie in retrofitting compartmentalisation into the billions of lines of existing software code, something that requires a high degree of automation.

Our research has made progress tackling certain parts of these challenges. We proposed FlexOS, which is an operating system designed with flexible compartmentalisation in mind, composed of components that can be isolated at configurable granularities (adjustable levels of detail and scope), via a range of hardware protection mechanisms, with various data sharing strategies and further optional software protections.

On testing, we found that adapting FlexOS – with a further microprocessor designed to enhance the security benefits of compartmentalisation – reduced the performance and engineering costs.

We also studied the problem of securing cross-compartment interfaces when compartmentalisation is retrofitted in legacy software – an issue vastly overlooked by past compartmentalisation research. Our research has also shown there is no agreed definition of the field of software compartmentalisation among academic and professional communities, resulting in research output falling short of what compartmentalisation really needs to be reach the mainstream. To tackle this, we have characterised and classified more than 200 research works into an organised knowledge base – a paper that evaluates, systematises, and contextualises existing knowledge – on the topic of compartmentalisation. The outcome is a unified model providing a framework for defining, understanding, and implementing this practice.

A future for compartmentalisation?

Compartmentalisation can play a key role in the much-needed shift from reactive to proactive software security, and aligns well with the recent recommendations made by the National Semiconductor Strategy regarding security by design, computer systems memory safety, supply chain security, among others. There is a role for policymakers to play to help bring compartmentalisation to the mainstream and unlock its safety benefits for a broader range of applications.

Much of the expertise in the field lies in academia, however the security problems compartmentalisation can address occur in the industrial and public sectors. That gap can only be bridged by strong collaborations between academic, industry and public actors, and lessons for future collaborations can be learnt from the Digital Security by Design programme, that successfully integrated several years of compartmentalisation research within industry products. Our software compartmentalisation framework should be integrated into an updated Cyber Assessment Framework – a collection of cyber security guidance for organisations that play a vital role in the day-to-day life of the UK. This would help increase awareness outside of academia about compartmentalisation, and the security issues it addresses.

Training in compartmentalisation needs to be developed, presenting concretely what this practice involves, how to apply it, and what its costs and benefits are. These materials should target different actors with variable degrees of expertise, for example developers, system administrators, and government (for example intelligence agencies such as GCHQ). This training can be implemented by developing professional development certifications and government-backed learning resources to encourage its use.

An interesting starting point would be to explore how compartmentalisation can be related to emerging methods used to consider the safety of integrated software components, for example the Software Bill Of Materials. This is an often-cited tool which lists the component parts and software dependencies of a software package and is designed to help vendors and developers better understand the open source and third-party components it may contain.

The development of standard methods to report identified vulnerabilities should also be encouraged, along with a classification of high-level compartmentalisation vulnerabilities categories. In line with the research objectives listed above, we also need the development and use of standard metrics to assess, compare, and estimate the costs/benefits of compartmentalisation.

The use of compartmentalisation can be encouraged further by pushing for minimum requirements based on these standard metrics for software used in various settings, and should be introduced in government departments, starting with teams working with particularly sensitive data.

Software compartmentalisation has shown itself to be highly efficient in the fight against modern cyber threats, yet this practice remains little known and underused. This needs to change, urgently.