Iran targeting UK military sites, MI5 chief warns; AI could enable bioweapons

Iran is trying to hit military sites in the UK and the suspected plot to attack a USrun military air base in September is not unique the head of Britains MI5 spy agency said TuesdayKen McCallum who leads the UKs domestic security service said Tehran is seeking to intensify its attacks in Britain beyond the traditional targets of Iranians opposed to the countrys Islamic authoritiesThat has included arson and sabotage attacks on Jewish sites that Britain says were carried out by Iranian proxiesMcCallum said another major shift this year has been Iranian ambitions to come at harder targets like military sitesThe incident at RAF Fairford is not unique There have been other examples not just in the UK but around the world McCallum saidMcCallum delivered a speech outlining major threats to the UK as detectives investigate a suspected terror plot against the USrun base in western England which has been used to bomb Iran during this years warScores of residents were evacuated from their homes near the base on Sept 27 as armed police officers and army bombdisposal experts swarmed the rural area Police later said they had found a quantity of an accelerant gasoline in three vans at the site but no explosivesBritish authorities have linked Tehran to the incident which led the US to pull its bombers from RAF Fairford Prime Minister Andy Burnham said Monday that the apparent plot was almost certainly directed by Irans Revolutionary GuardSeven men in their 20s have been arrested and released on bail under investigationIran has denied involvement although it has previously said that it considers any base used to attack its territory a legitimate targetMI5 says AI could bring bioweapon riskIn a stark speech McCallum argued that the UK faces a new era of national security and is at a turning point equivalent to the 911 attacks a quarter century agoHe said his agencys work countering state threats chiefly from Russia Iran and China has quadrupled in the past decade and claimed that both Russia and Iran are expanding their hybrid warfare campaigns against the UKMeanwhile technology is racing ahead with artificial intelligence supercharging the cybersecurity battle between attackers and defenders he saidMcCallum said terror plotters have used artificial intelligence for reconnaissance and attacks including AIenabled drones Even more concerning he said is AIs potential to change the stakes on existing or even new bioweaponsHe said terror groups would dearly love to have chemical biological or radiological weapons but these are hard to obtainOne risk is that AI could enable dangerous knowledge to get into the hands of people we would all rather didnt have that knowledge he said A second and different risk acirciquestbrvbar is the possibility that AI could generate novel pathogens not previously seenMcCallum said MI5 has set up a new AI Threat Assessment Centre to try to keep ahead of the risksHuman history has given us no experience of facing an actor which is smarter than we are It is capable of outthinking us This is genuinely novel and deserves the serious attention it is getting including in MI5 he saidThis story has been sourced from a third party syndicated feed agencies Midday accepts no responsibility or liability for its dependability trustworthiness reliability and data of the text Midday managementmiddaycom reserves the sole right to alter delete or remove without notice the content in its absolute discretion for any reason whatsoever