Terrorists are plotting drone attacks in Britain and could kill using bioweapons as AI 'supercharges' threats, warns the head of MI5

Artificial intelligence is ‘supercharging’ the terrorist threat enabling potential attacks on the UK with drones and bioweapons, the head of MI5 warned today.

Sir Ken McCallum said AI may be exploited by terror groups to ‘create new pathogens’ in order to spread death and disease.

The spy chief also revealed that MI5 is already catching terrorists seeking to use AI-enabled drones to carry out attacks in Britain.

Following advances in drone weaponry on the battlefield in Ukraine where bombings can be carried out remotely by teams miles away from enemy lines, MI5 fears the technology could be copied by terrorist groups to perpetrate attacks here in the UK.

In his annual speech, the Director General revealed the emerging national security risk posed by AI was getting ‘serious attention’ within MI5, alongside its work to counter a rampaging threat from hostile states.

MI5’s state threat caseload has quadrupled in the last decade, with the Security Service now devoting more resources to counter it than during the Cold War.

But the spy chief said his agency must consider the threats of the future.

‘Today, AI is already supercharging the cybersecurity contest between attackers and defenders.

‘It can produce propaganda and radicalising material tailored to the individual,’ he said.

‘We've caught terrorists seeking to exploit AI to improve their reconnaissance and attack methodologies, with AI-enabled drones adding a new twist.

‘Not yet realised - but the misuse case to which I’d attach greatest weight is AI’s potential to change the stakes on existing or even new bioweapons.

‘These risks are real.’

He suggested that AI could be used by both terrorists and hostile states to develop lethal bioweapons.

The technology could also be used by groups like Al Qaeda to identify loopholes in security around virus research and development in the UK.

When asked whether AI could turn the common cold into a lethal virus, he said: ‘One concern would be that comparatively low sophistication actors may have an ability uplift in the area here if these guardrails do not function as intended.

‘For the last 25 years, if you look at Al Qaeda in particular, it has long been that many terrorists would dearly love to have some capability around chemical, biological or radiological weaponry, but that has not been easy for them to achieve.

‘One risk - this has not yet manifested - but one risk is that AI could enable dangerous knowledge to get into the hands of those who we all would not rather didn’t have that knowledge.

‘A second different risk, much discussed on open source and I am not in any way seeking to hype this risk, but it deserves sober attention, is the possibility that AI could generate a number of pathogens not previously seen.

‘These are among the risks we are seeking to address with our many partners in the UK and internationally.’

He added: ‘Of the various risks of human misuse of AI, the one that has me and colleagues particularly focused on, bioweapons is an area where the government is taking additional steps.’

Speaking at the Thames House headquarters, he said: ‘MI5 is devoting more resource to countering state threats than during the Cold War.’

He warned of proxy attacks from not just Russia, but Iran, which has been blamed for last month's plot at RAF Fairford in Gloucestershire.

Sir Ken warned Tehran has ambitions to ‘come at harder targets, like military sites’, adding that the Fairford plot was ‘not unique in the UK’.

There have been more than 50 arrests in the UK in 12 months related to Iran.

But Russia remains ‘aggressor number one as Putin's Kremlin continues to lash out at the UK and its allies’ in an intimidation tactic over the war in Ukraine, Sir Ken said.

He outlined how MI5 is also fighting off an espionage threat from China and a ‘significant’ increase in extreme Right-wing terrorism, linked to the migrant crisis.

He said: 'Over the last year the most marked trend has been an increase in cases where extremist version of anti-immigration and anti-Muslim grievance are tipping into terrorist intent. We've dealt, for example, with would-be terrorists aspiring to attack mosques and venues connected to immigration and asylum.'