Written question asked by Ben Spencer (Conservative) on Friday, 9 October 2026, in the House of Commons. It was due for an answer on Tuesday, 13 October 2026. It was answered by Luke Pollard (Labour) on Monday, 19 October 2026 on behalf of the Ministry of Defence.
Ministry of Defence: Cryptography
- Question
-
To ask the Secretary of State for Defence, what assessment he has made of the proportion of the Department's cryptographic estate that cannot be upgraded to post-quantum standards without hardware replacement; and what the replacement timetable is.
- Answer
-
The Ministry of Defence is assessing its cryptographic dependencies as part of its preparations for transition to post-quantum cryptography. This work will determine where migration can be achieved through software or firmware updates and where hardware replacement will be necessary.
This assessment remains ongoing and it is therefore not currently possible to provide a definitive proportion or replacement timetable. Necessary replacements will be managed through Defence's post-quantum migration planning and appropriate equipment refresh cycles.
Secondary information
- Type
- Written question
- Reference
- 32094
- Session
- 2026-27
- Subjects
- ICT Ministry of Defence Cryptography Quantum technology
- Contains statistics
- Yes
- Link
- View this Written question on www.parliament.uk
Librarians' tools
- Timestamp
- 2026-10-20 10:53:16 +0100
- URI
- http://data.parliament.uk/writtenparliamentaryquestion/commons/2026-27/32094
- In Indexing
- http://indexing.parliament.uk/Content/Edit/1?uri=http://data.parliament.uk/writtenparliamentaryquestion/commons/2026-27/32094
- In Solr
- https://search.parliament.uk/claw/solr/?id=http://data.parliament.uk/writtenparliamentaryquestion/commons/2026-27/32094