Future AI weapons such as drones should have moral code, says former UK spy chief

Software could make ethically superior decisions to humans in high-pressure moments, claims ex-GCHQ head David Omand Drones will need to be programmed with moral guidelines as AI-driven decision making reduces human involvement in autonomous warfare, according to a former UK spy chief. David Omand told the Guardian that he had changed his mind on unmanned weapons systems, more than a decade after concluding that autonomous drones could not comply with international humanitarian law. The former head of GCHQ – the UK’s listening agency – said he now believed AI could create a “moral” framework for unmanned weapons that could differentiate between combatants and civilians. Omand said he been swayed by the “speeding-up” of modern warfare, as shown by the deployment of weapons such as drones and hypersonic missiles, and the emergence of generative AI which had given states a “potentially ethical way” of allowing drones to operate under morally compliant systems. “My call is to really get some work done on this, so that we’re not left in a situation where there isn’t a moral component built into future AI-powered weapon systems,” he said. His intervention came as the armed forces ministe