Sir Richard Moore, the head of the United Kingdom’s Secret Intelligence Service, MI6, made a speech at the British Embassy in Prague today, 19 July, in which he revealed some of the service’s current focuses and how it is — and isn’t — incorporating artificial intelligence into its important, secretive work.

Most pertinently, Moore, who is codenamed “C”, divulged that in the scope of MI6’s strategic focus is Russia amid the ongoing Ukrainian war, as well as China. Moore said that authoritarian regimes are increasingly using artificial intelligence to wage wars of disinformation and propaganda.

To outmove adversaries and protect the UK and other countries from active threats, Moore explained that “My teams are now using AI to augment – but not replace – their own judgement about how people might act in various situations.”

One example he provided is that MI6 teams combining their skills with AI and bulk data to first identify and then subsequently disrupt the flow of weapons to Russia for use against Ukraine.

Although AI and machine learning have been adopted by MI6, Moore stressed that what’s core to MI6 is the “human factor” and that it’s the team’s innate, human traits which will continue to prevail.

“The unique characteristics of human agents in the right places will become still more significant. They are never just passive collectors of information: our agents can be tasked and directed; they can identify new questions we didn’t know to ask; and sometimes they can influence decisions inside a government or terrorist group,” he said.

However, Moore did add the caveat that “we should expect the frontiers of machine capability to advance with startling speed.”

“In future, as AI begins to overtake some aspects of human cognition, it’s possible that digital tools may come to understand – or rather, to be able to predict – human behaviour better than humans can,” he put forward.

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Today’s public speech was the second speech Moore has given since becoming MI6’s chief in October 2020.

In his first speech, in November 2021, Moore warned that “Our adversaries are pouring money and ambition into mastering artificial intelligence, quantum computing and synthetic biology, because they know that mastering these technologies will give them leverage.”

He noted that “Meeting the technological challenge head on by opening up – to an unprecedented degree – to partners who can help us master the technologies we need for our operations, and to enable us to innovate faster than our adversaries,” was a key part of his own mission.