The new chief of Britain’s electronic spying agency, GCHQ, has accused US technology groups of becoming “the command and control networks of choice” for terrorists in a broadside against Silicon Valley on his first day in office.
Writing in today’s Financial Times, Robert Hannigan, the director of GCHQ, accuses US tech companies of being “in denial” about the misuse of their services even as he calls for them to co-operate with intelligence agencies. “However much they may dislike it, they have become the command and control networks of choice for terrorists and criminals, who find their services as transformational as the rest of us.”
Most internet users, he adds, “would be comfortable with a better and more sustainable relationship between the [intelligence] agencies and the tech companies”.