The UK government will spend £130m on AI cyber defence, including a National Cyber Shield that uses agentic AI to protect critical infrastructure. The money is part of a package of more than £600m for AI that the Chancellor, John Healey, will put in this week’s Budget.

HM Treasury set out the plans in a statement on Saturday, ahead of the Budget on Wednesday.

Where the cyber money goes

The National Cyber Shield gets £60m. That includes a £25m challenge fund for UK AI and cybersecurity companies. The government will also scope a regulatory sandbox for agentic security tools across critical infrastructure, the public sector and industry.

Another £70m will set up a National Exposure and Real-Time Vulnerability (NERV) Centre.…