Ncsc Legal Advisors

**Equality, Diversity and inclusion are critical to GCHQ’s mission.**

Find out more about our culture, working environment and diversity on our website:
**The Organisation**

At GCHQ, we unlock the complex world of data and communications to keep the UK and its citizens safe, both in the real world and online. Working closely with our British Intelligence partners in MI5 and MI6, we protect the UK from threats including serious organised crime, terrorism, and cyber-attacks. A role in GCHQ means you’ll have varied and fascinating work in a supportive and encouraging environment that puts the emphasis on teamwork.

The National Cyber Security Centre (NCSC), part of GCHQ, is the UK Government’s lead authority on cyber security. The organisation is at the heart of the Government’s cyber security strategy and has the aim of making the UK the safest place to live and work online.

The National Cyber Security Centre (NCSC) seeks 2 lawyers with commercial law experience to join its legal team.

The NCSC legal team’s work is nationally important and fulfilling and we work closely with our clients to identify, mitigate and manage legal risk. The team has a range of areas of focus: emerging technology, telecoms, cyber incident management, cyber regulation, cyber operations and commercial. We are looking for highly motivated lawyers with excellent communication skills and a willingness to learn about the technical work for which NCSC is valued.

The NCSC legal team is a team of qualified lawyers from a variety of public and private sector backgrounds. It is part of the wider GCHQ legal team, which is currently split roughly 50/50 between commercial and operational lawyers and between London and Cheltenham.

The NCSC Legal Team is looking for applicants with a background in commercial law.

This role offers a real diversity of commercial work, and the successful applicant will need to be willing to step away from standard templates and think creatively about commercial arrangements. It also offers exposure to a diverse range of complex, novel and politically sensitive legal issues arising from our relationships with stakeholders in Government, the public sector and wider critical national infrastructure. The successful applicant must be willing to learn quickly about new areas of law and technology and will have the opportunity to work closely with global experts on managing cyber security risk in emerging technology.

The role may cover some or all of the following areas of work:

- Engaging with cyber security projects throughout their lifecycle, advising from the initial stages of development through to deployment at scale.
- Advising on a wide range of commercial procurement and intellectual property licencing matters to enable the NCSC to best exploit cyber security offers from the marketplace.
- Working closely with suppliers in the cyber security community on innovative, unique, and frequently sensitive projects to help deliver the NCSC’s mission.
- Advising the NCSC on various aspects of data protection law as it relates to a novel and ambitious set of data sharing and collaboration projects.
- Assisting NCSC incident management in their engagement with victims of a cyber-attack to facilitate effective information sharing and protect commercially sensitive data.
- Advising on the impact and scope of cyber regulation in the UK, as well as legal issues arising from our relationships with cyber regulators.
- Supporting the policy teams that provide cyber security and national security advice to wider government to facilitate decisions in relation to supply chains, exports, procurement and investment.

**Person Specification**

**_ The successful applicant must be qualified to practise as a Solicitor, Barrister or Chartered Legal Executive in England and Wales and should have experience in some of the following areas, but it is not necessary to have experience of all of them:_**
- commercial and contract law;
- intellectual property protection and licensing;
- technology contracts;
- data protection and data sharing arrangements;
- procurement law including major programmes; and/or:

- cyber, telecoms or general regulatory law.

Applicants will need to demonstrate:

- excellent powers of analysis and the ability to think creatively about legal problems;
- the ability to assess, analyse and balance legal risk;
- curiosity and willingness to learn about the technical work of the NCSC; and
- a collegiate and supportive approach to team working and dealing with clients.

**Civil Service Behaviours**
- Communicating and Influencing - Level 4
- Working Together - Level 4
- Managing a Quality Service - Level 4

Further information on Civil Service Behaviours

**Benefits we offer**

At NCSC and GCHQ, we are proud of our inclusive and supportive working environment that’s designed to encourage open minds and attitudes. As an organisation that values and nurtures talent, we are committed to helping you fulfil y