MI5 looking at potential risk from out-of-control AI

British spies have begun work on tackling the potential risk posed by rogue artificial intelligence (AI) systems, the head of MI5 said.

Sir Ken McCallum said it would be “reckless” to ignore the potential for AI to cause harm.

In a speech at the Security Service’s Thames House headquarters, he insisted he was not “forecasting Hollywood movie scenarios” but the intelligence agencies had to consider the risks.

He said: “MI5 has spent more than a century doing ingenious things to out-innovate our human – sometimes inhuman – adversaries.

“But in 2025, while contending with today’s threats, we also need to scope out the next frontier: potential future risks from non-human, autonomous AI systems which may evade human oversight and control.

“Given the risks of hype and scaremongering, I will choose my words carefully: I am not forecasting Hollywood movie scenarios.

“I am, on the whole, a tech optimist who sees AI bringing real benefits.

“But, as AI capabilities continue to power ahead, you would expect organisations like MI5 and GCHQ and the UK’s ground-breaking AI Security Institute, to be thinking deeply, today, about what defending the realm might need to look like in the years ahead.

“Artificial intelligence may never ‘mean’ to cause us harm. But it would be reckless to ignore the potential for it to cause harm.”