All products featured on WIRED are independently selected by our editors. However, we may receive compensation from retailers and/or from purchases of products through these links.
In a rare public speech, the chief of MI6 has said new surveillance laws, regarded by critics as highly intrusive, have provided British intelligence services with the legality it needs to battle the “existential threat” brought by data and the internet. But that MI6 must never “undermine the values we defend”. Read more: What is the IP Act and how will it affect you?
Alex Younger, who became the sixteenth ‘C’ in 2014, gave a wide-ranging talk to a group of journalists at the MI6 headquarters in Vauxhall, highlighting the need for “continuity” among allies including 5Eyes, and counterparts in France and Germany, in the wake of Brexit and Donald Trump’s election win, and Assad’s grave mistake in “defining as a terrorist anyone who opposes a brutal government”.
Throughout, he emphasised how vital it is for MI6 to maintain its “values” - it provides the organisation with a legitimacy that ultimately protects it and its work. He suggested Russia and Syria’s attempts to counter terrorism will likely “provide proof” just how important it is to be regarded a legitimate body: “beyond any of our capabilities, it is legitimacy that is the strongest weapon against international terrorism.”
Referring to the Investigatory Powers Bill - which was recently passed into law and legitimises the kind of bulk data collection MI5, MI6 and GCHQ were found to have unlawfully carried out for a decade - Younger reiterated the importance of those values, essentially in maintaining its legitimacy and trust in its work among the public.
He said the “checks and balances” the law provides, “including a double-lock of Ministerial and independent judicial authorisation for the most intrusive activities” are vital “as a means of ensuring your confidence, even as our activities remain secret”.
“But that cannot be the whole story,” he continued. “The concepts of ‘cyber’ and ‘bulk data analysis’ are frequently described in other-worldly terms, which belie their true nature: that they are man-made phenomena. When it comes to cyber warfare, it is not computers that are attacking us; it is people using computers...”
“...So the ultimate protection lies in our character and that of the country we serve. My officers are not from another planet; they are representative of the wider public and driven by the simple desire to protect our country.
“There is a pernicious myth that, somehow, intelligence services are moral equivalents. That the end justifies the means, whatever the cost. Much of the fictional portrayal of us is along those lines; and it is wrong. We are a human organisation and we will make mistakes. We will have the courage to learn from them. But, fundamentally, we understand that if we undermine the values we defend, even in the name of defending them, then we have lost.”
Read more: MI6, MI5 and GCHQ 'unlawfully collected private data for 10 years'
Admitting that the advent of the internet age had “turned our business on its head”, he assured the room MI6 had also recognised the “golden opportunity” it brings. “Used lawfully with full adherence to the concepts of necessity and proportionality, it can transform our ability to spot opportunities and threats alike”.
“We need to be as fleet on foot on the highways and byways of cyberspace as we are on the streets of Raqqa. This is where we reap the dividends of our partnership with GCHQ. This is why we will use the opportunity of growth provided by our recent funding settlement to attract those with the skills we need to effect this transformation. And this is why we need to have the legal basis and capabilities now provided by the IP Act.
“Incidentally, despite being C, I too am a member of the public and fully understand that, when it comes to access to data, the public will need and want to hold us to a particularly high standard of account. This is an issue across both the public and private sector that raises a range of novel and important ethical and legal issues.”
Younger focused his talk on three main tenants of MI6’s work: counter-terrorism, cyber, and ‘strategic advantage’. The latter is a somewhat murkier area and relates to obtaining intelligence which “fused with other sources of information, allows the government to make the right decision, at the right time. To illuminate the most impenetrable policy dilemmas and give the UK the information advantage in a competitive world”. One of the main aims of this work, though, is to address a phenomena MI6 names “hybrid warfare” - “cyber-attacks, propaganda or subversion of democratic process”. Younger explains that MI6 sees itself as embracing globalisation and its benefits in the right way. Those with “hostile intent” are using globalisation for nefarious purposes.
Younger’s talk was an unusual move for MI6, which is necessarily cloaked in secrecy. It was an attempt to display an element of transparency and relatability at a time when many have criticised the intrusive and potentially overreaching effects of the IP Act, and what that means for the future of MI6, MI5 and GCHQ. After introducing himself, the chief used the greatest popular culture example of British spy culture to both appear approachable and normalised, and to counter its portrayal of MI6: “I’m conflicted about Bond. He has created a powerful brand for MI6 - as C, the real life version of M - there are few people who will not come to lunch if I invite them...were Mr Bond to apply to join MI6 now, he would have to change his ways.”
C went to great lengths to use the opportunity to clarify that MI6 is for the people, and steadfast in the wake of some of the most tumultuous political times this young century has seen. As such, he paid tribute to “the strength of the intelligence relationship with the US and our other 5EYES counterparts, and the quality of the work we do with our European partners, France and Germany foremost amongst them. We share values and we face common threats. I’m often asked what effect the big political changes of 2016, Brexit and the US election, result, will have on these relationships. My answer is that I will aim for, and expect, continuity. These relationships are long lasting and the personal bonds between us are strong. The threats that we faced before these events have not gone away. The joint capabilities we had before, exist now. Indeed they are stronger.”
“These partnerships save lives in all our countries.”
It suggests that comments pre-Brexit that the split would not hamper our intelligence abilities, may be accurate. Former MI6 head Sir Richard Dearlove said: “the truth about Brexit from a national security perspective is that the cost to Britain would be low.” This flew in the face of the common thread touted by many in the Remain campaign, including now Prime Minister Theresa May who said our place within the EU made us “more secure from crime and terrorism”. Now that the time for campaigning is passed, Younger appeared to be keen to display a steady hand in tumultuous times, and more importantly a steady bond with counterparts across the globe and particularly within western Europe.
This article was originally published by WIRED UK
