OBR drags in cyber bigwig after Budget leak blunder

The Office for Budget Responsibility (OBR) has drafted in former National Cyber Security Centre (NCSC) chief Ciaran Martin to sniff out how its Budget day forecast wandered onto the open internet before the Chancellor had even reached the dispatch box.

Earlier this week, the OBR's November 2025 Economic and Fiscal Outlook (EFO) was quietly uploaded to a publicly accessible server in advance of publication. While it wasn't actually linked or listed on the OBR website, reporters quickly discovered the file simply by guessing its URL, which was so similar to that of a previous official document that the only real cyber skill required was remembering how months work.

The link, which was accessible 45 minutes before the Chancellor rose in the Commons, spilled the Budget's headline policies before she'd even announced them, marking a monumental cock-up that made the embargo optional.

OBR chair Richard Hughes was ...