Building trust in 6G Webinar - securing the UK's next generation of connectivity

6G will not simply be faster radio. It is emerging as a software-defined, programmable network fabric with AI embedded across the RAN, edge and core — a network that senses its environment as well as carrying traffic. Integrated sensing and communications (ISAC) turns the network itself into critical national infrastructure, and that makes openness and security inseparable. This opening session of techUK's Building Trust in 6G series examines the technical and policy architecture of a secure, sensing-capable 6G network, and what the UK must do in the next 24 months to lead rather than follow. 

What this webinar covers 

• ISAC as critical national infrastructure: what changes when the network becomes a sensor — UAV and airspace monitoring, transport safety, perimeter protection of CNI — and why this raises the stakes on 'secure by design'. 

• The legacy security debt 6G inherits from 4G and 5G, and what secure-by-design and Zero Trust actually require in a network that is simultaneously communicating and sensing. 

• Governance of sensing data: authorisation and access-policy enforcement, resolution limits as a privacy safeguard, and a use-case-led approach to responsible deployment. 

• Supply chain and vendor accountability in a disaggregated, multi-vendor ecosystem — and who is responsible when an autonomous, sensing-enabled system causes harm. 

• The next 24 months: spectrum decisions, standards input (3GPP Release 20/21 ISAC work) and UK positioning. 

Agenda 

• Welcome and framing from the techUK ACT programme (5 minutes) 

• Opening presentations: the ISAC and secure-by-design landscape for 6G (20 minutes) 

• Chaired panel discussion with industry, research and policy speakers (25 minutes) 

• Audience Q&A and closing remarks (10 minutes) 

Why it matters 

Resilience and commercial success are complementary, not competing, objectives. Decisions taken now on spectrum, standards and security architecture will determine whether the UK can build a 6G network that supports critical services, supply-chain resilience and wider innovation — or one that embeds new, opaque dependencies. This session gives members an early read on where the governance and accountability lines are being drawn, and how to feed into them. 

Who should attend 

Network security, architecture and radio research leads at operators and vendors; CNI and public-safety organisations exploring sensing use cases; policy and regulatory affairs teams working on the Telecommunications Security Act and Open Networks framework; standards and spectrum specialists; and members tracking the UK's 6G positioning.