Britain’s new MI6 chief, Blaise Metreweli, just delivered a warning: the struggle for power is drifting out of parliaments and into platforms, satellites, and lines of code.⁠
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In her first public speech (reported across BBC, the Guardian, Bloomberg, and Sky News), Metreweli said the UK is operating in “a space between peace and war”, where pressure is applied through “grey-zone” tactics that stay just below open conflict. She pointed to hybrid threats like cyber-attacks on infrastructure, drones appearing over airports and bases, sabotage, and information operations tied to Russia’s campaign against Ukraine.⁠
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But the sharper edge of her message was about technology itself. Metreweli argued power is becoming “more diffuse” and “more unpredictable” as control shifts from states to corporations, and sometimes to individuals. She didn’t name names in her speech, but coverage noted how private systems like satellite communications and giant social platforms can become strategic chokepoints.⁠
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Inside MI6, the response is an upgrade in tradecraft. Metreweli, who previously ran the agency’s technology arm (the real-world “Q branch”), said officers must be as comfortable with code as they are with human sources, “as fluent in Python” as they are in languages, because biometrics and data-rich borders punish old spy tricks. That also means spotting influence campaigns early, tracing where synthetic media originates, and protecting the data trails that modern intelligence runs on.⁠
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Security is now shaped as much by who governs powerful tech, and how truth survives algorithmic warfare, as by tanks and treaties. When algorithms reward outrage and falsehoods travel faster than fact, societies can be destabilized without a single shot fired, pushing the contest into attention, infrastructure, and credibility.⁠