Blaise Metreweli, the new director of MI6, will later warn of the “serious threat posed by Russia” in his first public speech.
She will focus on so-called hybrid warfare, which includes incidents such as cyberattacks and drones launched near critical infrastructure by suspected Russian proxies.
Ms Metveli described it as a “serious threat posed by an aggressive, expansionist and revisionist Russia”.
Turning to the war in Ukraine, she will insist Britain will keep up pressure on Russian President Vladimir Putin on behalf of Ukraine.
Ms Metveley, who took over as head of the Secret Intelligence Service this autumn, is the first woman to head Britain’s overseas spy agency. She succeeds Sir Richard Moore on 1 October.
Monday’s speech will mention recent sanctions against Russian entities accused of conducting information warfare, as well as two Chinese companies being sanctioned for “indiscriminate cyber activity targeting the UK and its allies”.
Western sanctions have undoubtedly hurt the Russian economy, pushing its exports eastward toward China and India. But they failed to change President Putin’s determination to wage war against Ukraine until Ukraine gave in to his territorial demands and ultimately became loyal to Moscow.
It was also clear from Ms Metwillie’s speech that a particular area of ​​interest for the new spy chief is technology.
She joined MI6 in 1999 and rose to the top position through the Q branch. Named after the fictional MI6 unit in Ian Fleming’s spy books, this is the real, inside, top-secret part of the Secret Intelligence Service that designed a variety of gadgets and gadgets to allow agents to communicate with their handlers without being detected and caught.
In a subsequent speech, she is expected to call on all intelligence officers to master technology “not just in our labs but in the field, in our intelligence technology… We have to feel comfortable with those technologies.” [computer] Write code just like we would using human resources, and become fluent in Python as you would in multiple languages.”
Python as a programming language may surprise some people because it has been around for over thirty years. But for the men and women who choose to work in the murky world of espionage, her perspective won’t go unnoticed.
In an age where data matters, when biometric scans can reveal a spy’s identity within seconds at borders and checkpoints, spies can no longer rely on false identities and MI6 needs to prove it is still relevant.
Elsewhere, Chief of the Defense Staff Sir Richard Knighton will on Monday call for a “whole-of-society approach” to build national resilience in the face of growing threats and uncertainty.
In a speech at the Royal United Services Institute in London, Sir Richard is expected to say defense and resilience need to be a higher priority for everyone, not just those in the military.
It is the latest in a series of warnings that the UK needs to be better prepared than it is now to deal with a growing number of threats.
Sir Richard is expected to say the situation is more dangerous than he has known throughout his career.
He said Russia has made clear that it wants to challenge, limit, divide and ultimately destroy NATO.
Britain’s response goes beyond strengthening its armed forces. Deterrence, he will say, involves harnessing Britain’s power, from universities to industry, the rail network and the NHS.
“A new era in defense means not just strengthening our military and our government – as we do – but strengthening our entire nation,” he said.
To address the skills gap highlighted in a recent report by the Royal Academy of Engineering, Sir Richard will talk about the need to work with industry and young people, and will announce £50 million in funding for a new Academy of Defense Technical Excellence.
France and Germany have both introduced plans for voluntary military service in recent weeks.
Last year, the then Conservative government put forward its own mandatory proposals, which Labor dismissed as a gimmick.
But the debate over how Britain as a whole should respond to an increasingly uncertain world is accelerating.
