MI5’s Director General, Andrew Parker, has given a speech at the Royal United Services Institute (RUSI) in London on the continuing threat of terrorism and how the Security Service and its sister agencies are adapting to respond.
He highlighted the enduring and diversifying threat from Al Qaida and its imitators. He also noted the work of MI5, GCHQ, the Secret Intelligence Service (MI6) and the police in countering the threat of terrorism and emphasised the extent to which the Security Service is accountable. In concluding his speech, he commented on a number of challenges that MI5 will face in the future, including rapid changes in technology and the growth of new electronic means of communications.
For the full text of the speech, see the MI5 website.
Andrew Parker was appointed Director-General of MI5 in April.
Some of what he said:
Since 2000, we have seen serious attempts at major acts of terrorism in this country typically once or twice a year. That feels to me, for the moment, unlikely to change.
The ability of Al Qaida to launch the centrally directed large scale attacks of the last decade has been degraded, though not removed. We have seen the threat shift more to increasing numbers of smaller-scale attacks and a growing proportion of groups and individuals taking it upon themselves to commit acts of terrorism. It remains the case that there are several thousand Islamist extremists here who see the British people as a legitimate target.
The internet is used by terrorists for many purposes: broadcasting their propaganda, radicalising vulnerable individuals, arranging travel, buying items, moving money and so on. But the primary issue is communication.
Through e-mail, IP telephony, in-game communication, social networking, chat rooms, anonymising services, and a myriad of mobile apps the terrorist has tens of thousands of means of communication. Many of those routes are now encrypted.
What we know about the terrorists, and the detail of the capabilities we use against them together represent our margin of advantage. That margin gives us the prospect of being able to detect their plots and stop them. But that margin is under attack.
Threats are diversifying, but not diminishing. The internet, technology and big data are transforming our society.
