The new head of Britain’s overseas intelligence service MI6 has warned the nation in her first public speech that the UK is “now operating in a space between peace and war” and “the front line is everywhere,” amid growing tensions with Russia.
Blaise Metreweli grew to become the first female chief of the Secret Intelligence Service’s 116-year historical past when she took up her submit this fall. Commonly known as “C,” the chief is the solely publicly named member of the famously secretive group.
In a speech at MI6 HQ in London on Monday, Metreweli highlighted the acute threat posed by Russia, and known as out Moscow’s makes an attempt to “bully, fearmonger and manipulate.”
“We all continue to face the menace of an aggressive, expansionist and revisionist Russia, seeking to subjugate Ukraine and harass NATO … (Putin) is dragging out negotiations and shifting the cost of war onto his own population,” she stated.
Emphasizing the must grasp new know-how, Metreweli stated current advances in synthetic intelligence, biotechnology and quantum computing might converge to create “science-fiction-like tools” which could possibly be used as perilous weapons.
The chief beforehand led the service’s know-how and innovation groups, a place made well-known as “Q” in the James Bond films.
From AI-powered robots that would have devastating impacts on the battlefield, to algorithims that would “become as powerful as states,” the new spy chief warned of the must harness “every byte of data” for the UK’s strategic benefit.
She additionally highlighted the more and more complicated panorama of threats dealing with the UK, which is being contested “from sea to space … battlefield to the boardroom. And even our brains, as disinformation manipulates our understanding of each other and ourselves.”
Security consultants say Russia has been waging a hybrid conflict on Western allies of Ukraine, following Moscow’s full-scale invasion of its neighbor. In the UK, Russian-backed operatives have set hearth to Ukrainian-linked factories, police stated.
Elsewhere in Europe, drones noticed close to airports have halted flights, NATO airspace has been violated in Poland and Romania, and underwater cables have been disrupted in the Baltic Sea, sparking fears of sabotage. Russia has not claimed duty for any involvement in these incidents.
The MI6 boss additionally underlined the energy of human company in tackling threats to UK safety.
“The defining challenge of the 21st century is not simply who wields the most powerful technologies, but who guides them with the greatest wisdom. Our security, our prosperity and our humanity depend on it,” Metreweli stated.
In a extra harmful, tech-mediated world, the chief known as for the “rediscovery of our shared humanity,” to find out how the future unfolds.
“Our world is being remade. And for the first time, we are all at the heart of it,” she stated.
“It is not what we can do that defines us, but what we choose to do. That choice – the exercise of human agency – has shaped our world before, and it will shape it again,” she added.
The MI6 chief’s deal with comes only a week after a speech by British Foreign Secretary Yvette Cooper, during which she highlighted the threat of data warfare. The authorities had sanctioned quite a few organizations and people chargeable for “delivering Russia’s information warfare,” Cooper stated, in addition to two China-based firms for his or her “vast and indiscriminate cyber activities against the UK and its allies.”
Earlier this 12 months, MI6 launched a web-based portal geared toward utilizing the darkish net to entice potential spies to ship secrets and techniques, notably targeting Russia.
The portal, known as Silent Courier, permits nameless entry to a safe MI6 messaging platform the place customers can ship info to UK intelligence companies from anyplace in the world. The launch got here after the former spy chief Richard Moore used a rare public speech in Prague in July 2023 to enchantment to Russian residents to spy for the UK.