Policy Adviser

Job summary

At DSIT we’re all about improving people’s lives by maximising the potential of science & technology.

We accelerate innovation, investment and productivity through world-class science, research and development.

We use technology for good by ensuring new and existing technologies are safely developed and deployed across the UK, with the benefits more widely shared.

We are driving forward a modern digital government which gives citizens a more satisfying experience and their time back.

We do all this to enable the Government’s 5 national missions: kickstarting economic growth, making Britain a clean energy superpower, taking back our streets, breaking down barriers to opportunity and building an NHS fit for the future.

Above all, we focus on improving people’s lives. Whether it’s researching new treatments for disease, developing better batteries, reducing burdens through better public services, keeping children safe online, and much more, outcomes for citizens are at the heart of what we do.

Our Inclusive Environment

We offer flexible working benefits, employee well-being support and a great pension. We are enormously proud to be a Disability Confident Leader employer. We support candidates with adjustments throughout our recruitment process. Information about disability confidence and just some examples of the adjustments that you can request can be found in the reasonable adjustment section below.

Please note

Former DSIT recruitment campaigns are continuing as usual, but candidates should be aware that following the Government’s announcement on the changes to some civil service departments, roles will be subject to the machinery of government moves and will ultimately be in one of the new departments. We will provide more information if you are selected for a role. This work remains of high importance to the civil service, and we thank you for your continued interest.

Job description

The Security and Online Harms (SOH) Directorate led on the development and passage of the Online Safety Act 2023 (OSA), which introduces a range of measures to tackle online harms and makes the UK the safest place to be online. Following a national consultation from March to May 2026, one of the largest engagement exercises undertaken by this Government, SOH will also deliver on the social media ban for under 16s.

The Directorate is now working on the implementation of these new laws, and is engaging with countries and institutions around the world to promote a safer environment.

The SOH Directorate is looking to appoint five enthusiastic and proactive Higher Executive Officers (HEO) to join the Directorate as Policy Advisers across both the Public Safety and Information Resilience Team, and the Strategy and Analysis Team.

The Public Safety Team works on some of the Government’s most high-profile online safety issues, developing policy to tackle online harms that impact social cohesion, and that respond to public safety incidents. The Team is also part of the cross-Government Joint Team on Pornography, contributing to the response to recommendations raised in Baroness Bertin’s Independent Pornography Review.

The Information Resilience Team delivers long-term policy initiatives to make audiences more resilient online. This includes work increasing media literacy across the UK and delivering commitments in the Protecting What Matters Action Plan.

The Strategy and Analysis Team provides strategic coordination across the SOH Directorate, leading stakeholder engagement and ministerial and parliamentary business to support online safety policy delivery.

Person specification

SOH is seeking four (4) HEOs to deliver its ambitious agenda across two key policy areas within its Public Safety and Information Resilience Team, and one (1) HEO to support the Directorate’s stakeholder engagement as part of the Strategy and Analysis Team:

In the Public Safety Team:

• 2x Pornography Review Policy Advisers
  
• 1x Societal Harms Policy Adviser
  
• 1 x Information Resilience Adviser

In the Strategy and Analysis Team:

• 1 x Stakeholder Engagement role
  

Find a short summary of each role’s key responsibilities below:

2x Pornography Review Policy Advisers: In December 2025, the Government announced the creation of a cross-Government Joint Team on Pornography (DCMS, Home Office, MOJ, and then-DSIT). Earlier this year, during passage of the Crime and Policing Bill, the Joint Team committed to presenting a Delivery Plan to Parliament by October 2026, setting out how the Government can tackle harms arising from online pornography through achieving greater parity between the regulation of offline and online pornography. The successful candidates will support the Joint Team to implement the Delivery Plan. This will involve engaging with a wide range of industry stakeholders and Parliamentarians to design and deliver key aspects of the Plan.

1x Societal Harms Policy Adviser: The team is developing and implementing policy solutions to protect the online information environment from threats to public safety and social cohesion. This includes improving our understanding the drivers of hateful and violent content online, and developing ways to stop people being able to profit from the creation and dissemination of harmful content. This successful candidate will support this work, which will include engaging with stakeholders across government, industry, academia, and civil society to better understand the drivers of harm in this area and formulate impactful measures in response.

1x Information Resilience Role: The Information Resilience policy team is responsible for strategic policy to counter online information threats, including leading the government’s policy and delivery of its approach to media literacy. Following the Government’s announcement of a social media ban for u16s, the Government committed to ensuring children and young people still have access to trusted, high-quality information to support their wellbeing, learning, and development. The successful candidate will support work to develop a shared cross government view on what categories of high-quality content children should have access to; develop initiatives in partnership with civil society, industry and subject matter experts to ensure this content is available and easily visible; and develop new guidance for parents and children on identifying positive content and using trusted sources. This will involve working closely with other government departments and a wide range of stakeholders across industry, civil society, and academia.

1 x Stakeholder Engagement role: As part of the Strategy and Analysis team within the Security and Online Harms Directorate, this role will support the Directorate's stakeholder engagement, ministerial and parliamentary work on high-profile online safety policy issues, including implementation of the Online Safety Act. The successful candidate will be required to draft high-quality briefings for senior officials and Ministers, including responses to Parliamentary Questions and stakeholder engagement commissions. They will work across the Directorate to coordinate contributions from policy teams and other government departments, manage incoming commissions and engage with Private Offices. The role holder will also help coordinate stakeholder engagement across the Directorate, maintaining robust records and supporting effective oversight of engagement activity. The role requires strong organisational and communication skills, and the ability to build effective working relationships.

Essential Criteria

For all roles:

• You will be confident at working independently to drive forward work.
  
• You will have excellent organisational skills and be able to deliver high-quality work at pace, whilst managing competing deadlines.
  
• You will be confident using data and information from a range of sources to reach credible conclusions.
  
• You will be skilled in explaining complex and technical concepts in a clear and accessible way, both verbally and in writing.
  
• You will also need to be able to build and maintain strong relationships with senior colleagues, across other Government Departments, and with external stakeholders.

Desirable Criteria

For all roles:

• Experience working on digital or legislative policy.

Behaviours

We'll assess you against these behaviours during the selection process:

• Communicating and Influencing
• Delivering at Pace
• Working Together

Benefits

Alongside your salary of £37,655, Department for Science, Innovation & Technology contributes £10,908 towards you being a member of the Civil Service Defined Benefit Pension scheme. Find out what benefits a Civil Service Pension provides (opens in a new window).

The Department for Science, Innovation and Technology offers a competitive mix of benefits including:

• A culture of flexible working, such as job sharing, homeworking and compressed hours.
• Automatic enrolment into the Civil Service Pension Scheme, with an employer contribution of 28.97%.
• A minimum of 25 days of paid annual leave, increasing by 1 day per year up to a maximum of 30.
• An extensive range of learning & professional development opportunities, which all staff are actively encouraged to pursue.
• Access to a range of retail, travel and lifestyle employee discounts.
• A hybrid office/home based working model where staff will spend a norm of 40-60% of their time in the office (minimum of 40%) over a month with flex dependent on balancing business and individual need.

Office attendance

The Department operates a discretionary hybrid working policy, which provides for a combination of working hours from your place of work and from your home in the UK. The current expectation for staff is to attend the office or non-home-based location for 40-60% of the time over the accounting period.

Things you need to know

Artificial intelligence

Artificial intelligence can be a useful tool to support your application, however, all examples and statements provided must be truthful, factually accurate and taken directly from your own experience. Where plagiarism has been identified (presenting the ideas and experiences of others, or generated by artificial intelligence, as your own) applications may be withdrawn and internal candidates may be subject to disciplinary action. Please see our candidate guidance (opens in a new window) for more information on appropriate and inappropriate use.

Selection process details

This vacancy is using Success Profiles (opens in a new window), and will assess your Behaviours and Experience.

After submission of the first stage of your application you will be invited to complete a Civil Service Judgement Test. If you successfully pass the test, you will be invited to complete the final stage of the application.

Please complete the online tests as soon as possible (within 24-48 hours is recommended), the closing date for the tests is 23:55 on 09/11/2026. If you fail to complete the online test before the deadline your application will be withdrawn. Guidance for the test will be available when you are invited to take the test. The tests are administered online and accessed via the CS Jobs website.

You will be directed to the Talogy - True Talent – Scheduled Maintenance Window Webpage for online tests during an outage.

Our online test supplier will be performing scheduled maintenance between 4 pm - Midnight London (GMT) on 1st November 2026. You will be unable to access tests during this period.

If you are in the middle of a test when the maintenance begins, your progress will be paused. You will be able to resume your test from where you left off via your application centre once the downtime has ended. Please note that you will not be able to launch any new tests while the system is offline.

As part of the application process you will be asked to complete a CV and a number of behavioural statements.

Further details around what this will entail are listed on the application form.

Applications will be sifted on behavioural statements and CV.

In the event of a large number of applicants, applications will be sifted on the CV only.

Candidates who pass the initial sift may be progressed to a full sift, or progressed straight to assessment/interview.

The interview will consist of behaviour-based questions.

Sift and interview dates

Sift and interview dates to be confirmed.

Further Information

Former DSIT recruitment campaigns are continuing as usual, but candidates should be aware that following the Government’s announcement on the changes to some civil service departments, roles will be subject to the machinery of government moves and will ultimately be in one of the new departments. We will provide more information if you are selected for a role. This work remains of high importance to the civil service, and we thank you for your continued interest.

For further information on National Security Vetting please visit the Demystifying Vetting website.

Reasonable Adjustment

We are proud to be a disability confident leader and we welcome applications from disabled candidates and candidates with long-term conditions.

Information about the Disability Confident Scheme (DCS) and some examples of adjustments that we offer to disabled candidates and candidates with long-term health conditions during our recruitment process can be found in our DSIT Candidate Guidance. A DSIT Plain Text Version of the guidance is also available.

We encourage candidates to discuss their adjustment needs by emailing the job contact which can be found under the contact point for applicants section.

If you are experiencing accessibility problems with any attachments on this advert, please contact the email address in the 'Contact point for applicants' section.

If successful and transferring from another Government Department a criminal record check may be carried out.

New entrants are expected to join on the minimum of the pay band.

A location based reserve list of successful candidates will be kept for 12 months. Should another role become available within that period you may be offered this position.

Candidates who meet the minimum benchmark may be placed on a Reserve List for consideration for similar roles, including those at a lower grade. Candidates who narrowly miss the benchmark and are not placed on the Reserve List may still be considered for an offer in a similar role at a lower grade.

Please note terms and conditions are attached. Please take time to read the document to determine how these may affect you.

Any move to the Department for Science, Innovation and Technology from another employer will mean you can no longer access childcare vouchers. This includes moves between government departments. You may however be eligible for other government schemes, including Tax Free Childcare; for further information visit the Childcare Choices website.

DSIT does not normally offer full home working (i.e. working at home); but we do offer a variety of flexible working options (including occasionally working from home).

DSIT cannot offer Visa sponsorship to candidates through this campaign.

DSIT holds a Visa sponsorship licence but this can only be used for certain roles and this campaign does not qualify.

In order to process applications without delay, we will be sending a Criminal Record Check to Disclosure and Barring Service /Disclosure Scotland on your behalf.

However, we recognise in exceptional circumstances some candidates will want to send their completed forms direct. If you will be doing this, please advise Government Recruitment Service of your intention by emailing Pre-EmploymentChecks.grs@cabinetoffice.gov.uk stating the job reference number in the subject heading.

For further information on the Disclosure Scotland confidential checking service telephone: the Disclosure Scotland Helpline on 0870 609 6006 and ask to speak to the operations manager in confidence, or email Info@disclosurescotland.co.uk

Applicants who are successful at interview will be, as part of pre-employment screening, subject to a check on the Internal Fraud Database (IFD). This check will provide information about employees who have been dismissed for fraud or dishonesty offences. This check also applies to employees who resign or otherwise leave before being dismissed for fraud or dishonesty had their employment continued. Any applicant’s details held on the IFD will be refused employment.

A candidate is not eligible to apply for a role within the Civil Service if the application is made within a 5 year period following a dismissal for carrying out internal fraud against government.

Feedback

Feedback will only be provided if you attend an interview or assessment.

Security

Successful candidates must undergo a basic (or equivalent) criminal record check.Successful candidates must meet the security requirements before they can be appointed. The level of security needed is security check (opens in a new window).

See our vetting charter (opens in a new window).People working with government assets must complete baseline personnel security standard (opens in new window) checks.

Nationality requirements

This job is broadly open to the following groups:

• UK nationals
• nationals of the Republic of Ireland
• nationals of Commonwealth countries who have the right to work in the UK
• nationals of the EU, Switzerland, Norway, Iceland or Liechtenstein and family members of those nationalities with settled or pre-settled status under the European Union Settlement Scheme (EUSS) (opens in a new window)
• nationals of the EU, Switzerland, Norway, Iceland or Liechtenstein and family members of those nationalities who have made a valid application for settled or pre-settled status under the European Union Settlement Scheme (EUSS)
• individuals with limited leave to remain or indefinite leave to remain who were eligible to apply for EUSS on or before 31 December 2020
• Turkish nationals, and certain family members of Turkish nationals, who have accrued the right to work in the Civil Service

Further information on nationality requirements (opens in a new window)

Working for the Civil Service

The Civil Service Code (opens in a new window) sets out the standards of behaviour expected of civil servants.

We recruit by merit on the basis of fair and open competition, as outlined in the Civil Service Commission's recruitment principles (opens in a new window).The Civil Service embraces diversity and promotes equal opportunities. As such, we run a Disability Confident Scheme (DCS) for candidates with disabilities who meet the minimum selection criteria.The Civil Service also offers a Redeployment Interview Scheme to civil servants who are at risk of redundancy, and who meet the minimum requirements for the advertised vacancy.

Diversity and Inclusion

The Civil Service is committed to attract, retain and invest in talent wherever it is found. To learn more please see theCivil Service People Plan (opens in a new window) and the Civil Service Diversity and Inclusion Strategy (opens in a new window).

Apply and further information

This vacancy is part of the Great Place to Work for Veterans (opens in a new window) initiative.The Civil Service welcomes applications from people who have recently left prison or have an unspent conviction. Read more about prison leaver recruitment (opens in new window).Once this job has closed, the job advert will no longer be available. You may want to save a copy for your records.

Contact point for applicants

Job contact :

• Name : Luca Everett
• Email : luca.everett2@dsit.gov.uk

Recruitment team

• Email : dsitresourcing.grs@cabinetoffice.gov.uk

Further information

Appointment to the Civil Service is governed by the Civil Service Commission’s Recruitment Principles. If you feel that your application has not been treated in accordance with the recruitment principles, and wish to make a complaint, then you should contact in the first instance DSITrecruitment.grs@cabinetoffice.gov.uk . If you are not satisfied with the response that you receive, then you can contact the Civil Service Commission. For further information on bringing a complaint to the Civil Service Commission please visit their web pages: Click here to visit Civil Service Commission/Complaints.

Attachments

DSIT T&Cs v1.2 Opens in new window (docx, 179kB)