MI5 Devoting More Resources to Countering State Threats Than During Cold War, Says Head
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MI5 is devoting more resource to countering state threats than during the Cold War, warns intelligence chief.
Sir Ken McCallum said Russia remained "aggressor number one", and warned MI5 was now facing a situation in which "our terrorism and state threats operational missions are pretty much of equal scale" because threats from foreign adversaries have "quadrupled".
In his annual address at MI5's headquarters in London, Sir Ken also warned of rising threats from Iran and "extreme right-wing terrorism".
He further mentioned MI5's successes in expelling Russian spies and the Kremlin's increasing reliance on paying proxies for attacks.
"These are not the actions of a great power with the strategic upper hand," he added.
Meanwhile, Sir Ken highlighted Iran's expanding hybrid campaign in the UK, with over 50 arrests made in the last year over Iran-linked activities, much of which has targeted Jewish communities.
The National Security Act, a 2023 law targeting foreign agents working against UK interests, has been heavily used to tackle threats from China, Iran, and Russia.
On emerging AI threats, Sir Ken expressed concern about extremist groups using AI to create bioweapons, emphasizing that while the risk is not yet realized, the technology could "change the stakes".
He concluded that the UK Intelligence Community is working with the AI Security Institute to counter these risks.
In April, the UK's terrorism threat level was raised to severe for the first time in five years, indicating a high likelihood of an attack.