Jeremy Fleming, Director of GCHQ, the UK intelligence agency, has recently claimed that the organisation are looking to use AI to boost national security and protect the country from cyber-attacks, reports the Financial Times.
In a time where AI is consistently weaponised by organisations and individuals for malicious purpose, Fleming is confident that “legal, proportionate and ethical” AI counter-strategy can help crack down on, not only “trolls”, but drug traffickers and other serious international criminals.
Where simpler functions such as translation have previously accounted for AI’s predominate use in agency’s such as GCHQ, security officials are now confident that – due to advances in data processing speed – machine learning can be used more ambitiously.
The expectation is that AI will allow analysts to manage “ever-increasing volumes and complexity of data, improving the quality and speed of decision-making.”
Fleming added that AI has a range of applications, “from identifying and countering ‘troll farms’ pedalling disinformation to mapping and tracking international networks that are helping to traffic people, drugs or weapons.
“In the hands of an adversary with little respect for human rights, such a powerful technology could be used for oppression.
“Inaction can let those who build the technology of tomorrow — whether a country or company — project their values or interests by stealth, poor design or inadequate diversity. The consequences are hard to overstate.”
With AI’s use authorised under the Investigatory Powers Act, Megan Goulding, a lawyer at Liberty, added: “The increased reliance on algorithms when it comes to our sensitive information should raise alarm bells over the sheer scale of snooping currently carried out on us.”
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