Malcolm Byrne (Wicklow-Wexford, Fianna Fail)
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I remind members of the constitutional requirement that they must be physically present within the confines of the Leinster House complex in order to participate in public meetings. Our meeting today is in two parts. We have been looking at AI in the context of security, cybersecurity and defence and this is our final module as part of that discussion. We are pleased to be joined by Professor Daniel Toal, who is professor and chair of electrical engineering and robotics and founding director of the Centre for Robotics and Intelligent Systems, CRIS, and Dr. Gerard Dooly who is an associate professor at the school of engineering and co-director of CRIS. I invite Professor Toal to deliver his opening statement and then Dr. Dooly to follow. After that we will open it to engagement with members.

Professor Daniel Toal:

Good morning and thank you all. I will not read my statement. I am visually impaired so I will try to more or less cover the same ground as I had in the written statement. I am, as the Chair said, professor of electrical engineering and robotics and chair of CRIS, which is really the only centre with that focus on the island. The focus is on marine, sea surface and airborne robotic systems. The airborne element comes on land and the marine element can come on land in riverine and lake environments, etc. I am an electrical engineer focused on robotics and have been working in the area of automation and robotics since the 1980s. I worked in the UK and came back to Limerick in the late 1980s. We started this area of field robotics in the late 1990s and from 2000, we have had the centre running, so it is running 26 years.

Other people who have addressed this committee have focused on the topic of AI, which is the hot topic at the moment in terms of access to online AI tools. Robotics is synonymous with artificial intelligence in that when people think of artificial intelligence, they quite often think of robotics. The field of robotics is really a parallel traveller with AI and there are elements of AI in robotics that you do not find in general AI in machine learning and the large language models, LLMs, which have become the topic at them moment. There are many different technologies to make these robotic systems work. The environment they are designed for matters. If it is deep ocean or high atmosphere considerations include the physics, the electronics, the sensor systems necessary, the filtering of data coming from sensor systems and the computer processing. The digital understanding of AI is also leveraging into that space but there are many sub-elements of robotics beyond the digital AI. Our focus is on that robotics piece and that is what we are here to discuss with members and answer questions about.

The needs in AI are exploding and we all know about that. There is need for AI in defence, cyber and those areas. There are obviously needs on the digital side. Everything that is accessible through the Internet potentially leaves you open to risks, but there are physical threats as well.

These relate to the Defence Forces, the marine environment, environmental protection, offshore renewable energy and the protection of our critical underwater infrastructure, such as subsea cables. A total of 75% of the digital traffic coming into Europe comes through Irish waters; 98% of digital traffic around the globe goes through subsea cables but 75% of the digital traffic that comes into Europe comes through Irish waters. There are also power interconnectors and gas pipeline interconnectors. There have been certain threats to those infrastructure elements published in the newspaper. You need a capability to respond to that. You need a capability to protect against dark shipping, and for drug interdiction, search and rescue or disaster response and recovery. There are many applications where you would need field robotics, such as on the underwater surface or in airborne systems. Having a national capability in that space is essential.

How does Ireland address these needs? We have worked in collaboration with many European countries. We are mostly European funded through competitive funding. All of our funding in our group stage has been competitive funding. It has come from Horizon Europe funding and a small amount of funding comes from collaborative science for peace projects with NATO and the Irish Naval Service as a partner. There is also a lot of Irish funding from Science Foundation Ireland and other agencies such as Enterprise Ireland.

We suggest that to address these requirements, Ireland will need to increase its use of field robotics in the navy, An Garda Síochána, the Coast Guard and in many State agencies, and include research, the Marine Institute and fisheries, protection of fisheries, monitoring in environmental protection, along with offshore wind. The international norm in these areas is that as well as the navies and coast guards developing those technologies, there are national centres, such as the National Oceanography Centre in the UK, Ifremer in France, Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution, the Monterey Bay Aquarium Research Institute, MBARI, and many more in the US, as well as Alfred Wegener Institute, AWI, in Germany and many more. There are centres of excellence in Kiel and all of our European partners. We do not have such a centre of excellence. We suggest Ireland should have a national centre of excellence to be able to support the service through the agencies, the navy and the Coast Guard, and to support leading-edge research and keep Irish robotics and field robotics at that cutting edge.

I will leave it there. My colleague, Dr. Dooly, will make his statement.

Dr. Gerard Dooly:

I thank the Cathaoirleach and members of the committee for the invitation today. I am a professor based at the school of engineering at the University of Limerick. I am also one of the directors of the centre for robotics and intelligent systems. My area of expertise is in robotics and AI, leading the drone systems operations within the University of Limerick and autonomous seaborne vessel research at UL. Professor Toal has set out the broader landscape. The committee has already heard substantial evidence on cybersecurity. I will focus on AI and physical robot systems and what it means for Ireland.

The single most consequential change in defence and security in the past 12 months is the operationalising of autonomous AI in physical platforms. Russia's spring 2026 offensive has stalled and an approximate cause is autonomous AI. AI targeting drones from Ukraine are cutting through the most extensive electronic warfare infrastructure on earth. AI technology embedded in robots is now mature and proliferating. Low-cost retrofit modules can multiply an existing drone's effectiveness. These systems do not rely on radio links which renders much of the standard electronic warfare and counter drone operations or toolkits ineffective.

This embedded AI design is not just for aerial systems or drones. It is also seen across ground systems, surface vehicles and subsea platforms. AI-enabled cyberattacks have been on the policy agenda for some time. However, AI in physical robot systems is a 2024 to 2026 phenomenon and a strategic variable for which Ireland and Irish capability is significantly under-developed.

The same autonomy that enables modern drone effectiveness defines the threat we face. No fielded mobile counterUAS or UAV capability, short of airborne overwatch with onboard effectors, closes the loop against an autonomous, visionguided robot system. This presents significant security risks. Detection systems and defeat systems exist. However, integrated mobile systems against the autonomous threat do not. Much of the kit being procured was designed to deal with the drone era of 2018, whose threat is no longer the relevant one. This is a significant issue that warrants the committee’s attention.

There is, however, also opportunity in this new AI defence realm. The same technology has significant surveillance, defence and search and rescue, SAR, capabilities and applications. Its cost profile and persistent nature offer an efficiency that is not achievable by manned systems alone. Our exclusive economic zone, EEZ, is ten times the size of our landmass. Surveillance of that area, monitoring of subsea cables, detection of dark shipping and protection of coastal approaches and borders is not achievable with crewed assets alone. Heterogeneous autonomous systems are precisely what the Defence Forces, Naval Service, Air Corps and An Garda Síochána need.

I thank the committee and welcome members' questions.

Malcolm Byrne (Wicklow-Wexford, Fianna Fail)
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I thank Professor Dooly. Members know the order in which questions are to be asked. I ask them to try to stick to five-minute slots for questions and answers.

Johnny Mythen (Wexford, Sinn Fein)
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In the witnesses' opinion, can Ireland provide its own national security?

Dr. Gerard Dooly:

The defence sector in Ireland is very small and has never really matured. It is growing, however, and a national entity is now growing in defence. Enterprise Ireland announced last week that it will support defence agencies. There are companies in Ireland already in this domain, such as Cathx Ocean and A-techSYN in Shannon, which we work with, and these defence agencies can grow and support the Irish need in this area.

Professor Daniel Toal:

As a neutral nation, our Defence Forces defend our home territories and are involved in peacekeeping. In different scenarios in the future, the world may change and put it on a war footing, but a realistic and optimistic view is that, while we need to grow defence, we do not need to become technically involved in large defence, NATO-type organisations. On the defence side we do, but not on the belligerent side.

Johnny Mythen (Wexford, Sinn Fein)
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Following on from that, is Professor Toal in favour of keeping Irish neutrality and the triple lock mechanism?

Professor Daniel Toal:

That is an issue that I am sure will be discussed in these Houses. We each may have personal views. I think it is correct to keep our neutral status. Whether the Security Council should be able to veto where our defenders go is perhaps up for debate. I do not know whether my personal view is an expert view in that regard, but I think the matter will come under examination.

Dr. Gerard Dooly:

My expertise is in robotics and AI. I do not hold an opinion on that. I am not sure what the university's opinion is. I am here to share my expertise on robotics.

Malcolm Byrne (Wicklow-Wexford, Fianna Fail)
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We are focusing on AI and robotics.

Johnny Mythen (Wexford, Sinn Fein)
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That is part of the question. The major question we all have, looking at the wars at the moment, relates to the witnesses' opinion on so-called killer robots, which use AI to select targets and citizens in different areas.

Professor Daniel Toal:

None of the robots we have developed, built and operate have a fully autonomous killer capability to act. All the robotics technology we are involved in has potential for a human on the loop. That is not quite "in the loop". The human is not flying in real time, but the human is overseeing. It is a step above. On AI and the ethics of AI, many international agreements are coming into place which say that should remain the case.

It should not be the case that robots are selecting targets.

Johnny Mythen (Wexford, Sinn Fein)
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Are there any facial recognition capabilities on the witnesses' systems?

Professor Daniel Toal:

No. We are doing field robotics investigating subsea cables, pipelines and shipwrecks. We have not done any robot systems that interact with humans in the field. There has been some work in medical robotics.

Dr. Gerard Dooly:

From my perspective, a lot of my projects are environmental monitoring. I can develop AIs to detect birds and whales for offshore planning and that kind of stuff. We work a lot with Birdwatch Ireland and the National Parks and Wildlife Service, NPWS. It is not warfare we are actually engaged in.

Johnny Mythen (Wexford, Sinn Fein)
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Would the witnesses see environmental protection or defence systems as the CRIS priority or objectives? What would be the most sought after?

Professor Daniel Toal:

Is that an either-or?

Johnny Mythen (Wexford, Sinn Fein)
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Yes.

Professor Daniel Toal:

We are a university research sector. We have worked in environmental protection, offshore renewable energy and with defence. To some extent, our technologies are needed in all those sectors. As a university research-led organisation, we should keep that focus but if there is a need for increased robotics in any one of those, we can support that. If there is a need for targeted robotics capability development in the Defence Forces, we can support that.

Dee Ryan (Fianna Fail)
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The gentleman are very welcome. I thank them for attending today and for giving us their time in preparing their statements and briefing the committee on the hugely important work they are doing at the University of Limerick. I first came across them a number of years ago when I received a briefing on their work in relation to floating offshore wind and the potential for supporting the development of that sector in Ireland with the critical capacity that they are developing for subsea surveillance and surface surveillance of our massive Irish waters which, as Dr. Dooly said, are seven to ten times the size of our country. It is critical that we develop these capabilities to support the development of that sector.

After becoming a Senator and joining this committee, I have been very interested in the work and research the witnesses are doing, and I see the relevance of it. I congratulate them on the significant number of PhD graduates they have brought through the system over the past 20 years. I saw the significance of that in the emerging threats we see in regard to hybrid warfare and defence and security. Of course Ireland is a neutral country but that does not mean we do not have a responsibility to protect ourselves and our capacity to defend ourselves with regard to our subsea cables, data and information technology, IT, and for our power and gas lines coming over. It was really important that the committee heard today about the capability that we do have, that we are not starting from a standing-still position, that capability exists within the country and that as we consider the need for development of those capabilities into the future, we recognise that we have some already in the country and experts who can help us with that.

Will either Professor Toal or Dr. Dooly outline how other European countries are addressing this increased need that we have for autonomous surveillance and defence and how they are structuring it?

Professor Daniel Toal:

On the defence side, many of our European partners are in NATO. They come together on the NATO side. Ireland is involved in some of the programmes. PEP-----

Dee Ryan (Fianna Fail)
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In the interest of time, I am thinking from the funding and capacity development perspectives. Professor Toal mentioned he could see that we might have a dispersed model here, where our own Army will need to develop its own capabilities and the Garda may need to but how does that compare to other countries in how they structure it?

Professor Daniel Toal:

Larger nations will obviously have a scale effect in that they will use more technology.

I am an adviser on the French oceanographic fleet and was nominated by the French Research Institute for Exploitation of the Sea, Ifremer. That organisation is largely funded by the state but it also competes for European and national funding in ocean science with an overlap into defence. The National Oceanography Centre in Great Britain is a national centre of excellence in marine robotics. Its brief has switched more to defence. It used to be non-defence. There is that sort of switch internationally such that a lot of these agencies and the funding in the EU under the Horizon Europe are switching to dual use.

Dee Ryan (Fianna Fail)
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I also sit on the Oireachtas Joint Committee on Further and Higher Education, Research, Innovation and Science so we have been hearing about that. It would be very interesting for Professor Toal to also come before that committee at some point in the future and perhaps also the Oireachtas Joint Committee on Defence and National Security because what he is doing crosses over all three of those areas. He said that in another EU countries, there is a centre of excellence. Is it largely academic?

Professor Daniel Toal:

No. It has a very strong academic partnership with professors in those organisations and links with local universities. In nearly every European and North American case, there are national centres of excellence, which we do not have in this space.

Dr. Gerard Dooly:

To clarify, in Ireland, there is almost no fund research funding for defence projects or dual use projects. That is on the cusp of change because within Europe, we compete with regard to Horizon Europe, which is also known as FP9. That is due for renewal into FP10. More than 50% to 60% of all funding under FP10 will be aligned to dual use so that even though not a lot of dual use research is happening in Ireland currently, the universities will adapt to those calls, we will compete under dual use calls under FP10 and there will be a lot of uptake within dual use projects over the next couple years in Ireland. Currently, there is almost zero funding for dual use projects.

Darren O'Rourke (Meath East, Sinn Fein)
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Could the witnesses give us a sense of some of the existing technologies? It might be interesting for the committee and the wider public to hear about the technologies that exist and are being developed, particularly with regard to our ability to monitor our seas and underwater cables. Could they tell us about the type of technologies in robotics and in AI? How is AI being used to advance such technologies and capacities? Could they also talk to some of the technical considerations and risks associated with the power of AI in those contexts?

Professor Daniel Toal:

As directors, we both overlap across the breadth of what we do but Dr. Dooly has a much stronger focus on the aero side and from surface into air, although he has lots of experience in underwater so we will go to him second.

I might start with the underwater focus. With regard to looking for lost vessels or inspections of subsea cables and subsea pipelines. we were offshore with the Irish navy in December on an investigation on the gas interconnector across the Irish Sea because of incidents over the past year and a half. It has been reported in the press that vessels have been loitering in the vicinity of those pipelines. To some extent, this relates to neutral nations and the risk of something like the Nord Stream where somebody attacks such a pipeline or attacks or drags an anchor over cables. This has happened in the Baltic Sea and off Norway.

Regarding the technology we used to deploy, we built our own and added advanced control systems onto commercial vehicles. There are two world-class rigid inflatable boats, RIBs, in Ireland. One is owned and operated by the Marine Institute.

We built one ourselves, but we also have a commercial one which was funded through SFI. We have developed a control system for the sonar imaging. The challenge is that underwater is a very challenging environment. Our focus is on operating in challenging marine environments, such as the north Atlantic in the winter. Wave conditions cause turbidity and very low visibility with camera systems. We combine lasers, sonar, video and data processing, including AI, moving as much as we can towards real-time data processing so we can have decision-making while at sea. The traditional way of doing marine science and survey was to collect the data, come back and inspect it and then decide if there was a need to revisit later on. With the advance in computing, AI and all the imaging technologies, and there are myriad technologies, the advantage is we can do more in closer to real time or actually in real time. We have built our own systems and integrated those with Marine Institute vessels and Irish navy vessels. We have been on NATO research vessels in the Mediterranean and many vessels around the world. I will hand over to Dr. Dooly for additions.

Dr. Gerard Dooly:

When we look at what Ireland is doing currently, we are significantly investing in defence equipment and personnel and pushing in to Air Corps, Army and navy. When we look at that approach, we plan to have a certain number of vessels off. We are investing in vessels, manpower and maritime patrol area vehicles. As an island nation, we have a huge area to survey and a large border that we need to protect from threats and also in respect of fisheries. It is not possible to do that with manned systems. Ireland does not have the resources to invest enough personnel, ships and aircraft to actually man our area. If we look at autonomous systems, such as the drones built by A-techSYN in Shannon, they build drones that fly for eight, ten or 12 hours. At a fraction of the cost of maritime patrol vessels, they can work hand in hand with those maritime patrol vessels and do an effective capability. We could have 50 of those aircraft to one maritime patrol aircraft. That is the cost barrier. Also, when we look at what is being interpreted, it is manually interpreted so there is a delay there and a cost. When we move to AI, we are doing autonomous interpretation of those datasets. We get a near real-time response if there is a vessel or if there is some activity going on. We can use AI to enable those tools.

When we look at the surface vehicle domain too, it is the same effect. For a vessel to do maritime patrol across our ocean, it costs a significant amount in terms of infrastructure, personnel and supply. There are also time delays. If we had autonomous surface vessels, we could have a number of them off our shore for the same cost as a manned system. When we look at Ukraine and different wars that are going on, that is what is happening. They are moving from manned systems to autonomous systems. There is a benefit in defence and in surveillance. In terms of border security, there is a huge benefit to moving to AI and autonomous robots.

James Geoghegan (Dublin Bay South, Fine Gael)
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I thank our witnesses. I might start with Dr. Dooly. In his opening statement he said: "The single most consequential change in defence and security in the past 12 months is the operationalising of autonomous AI in physical platforms." For the ordinary man in the street, could he just elaborate on that in plain English terms? What are we talking about there?

Dr. Gerard Dooly:

When we look at what is going on in Ukraine, there is a large no man's land of maybe 30 km or 40 km at this stage. What goes on there is drone warfare. Drone warfare would have started off with a person with a controller, like a DJI drone or a normal, traditional drone, and they are strapping munitions onto that. There is an RF radio link between the operator, the pilot and the drone. That is where it started. Then they introduced EM warfare, killing the radio waves from the drone and the operator.

James Geoghegan (Dublin Bay South, Fine Gael)
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What is EM warfare?

Dr. Gerard Dooly:

It is electromagnetic interference, basically. That means flooding the radio waves such that there is no link between the drone operator and the drone. The drone then loses comms and either stays non-active or it crashes. What happened after all the radio waves had been killed was they started using fibre optic-tethered drones. They started tethering the drones. They came up with a way to combat that as well by cutting the fibre optic tethers. There were also distance issues. Warfare and what is going on in Ukraine is changing what is going on in terms of AI and robotics because it is at the forefront of research and development. I know it is warfare, but it is research and development. After using fibre optic drones and trying to expand the distance, what they looked to then were AI drones. An AI drone is what the Deputy's colleague talked about as maybe facial recognition. We develop AIs for bird detection, mammal detection and other detection in environmental science. Mostly what I do is environmental science.

James Geoghegan (Dublin Bay South, Fine Gael)
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Is the usage of the technology in warfare in Ukraine having a direct impact now on the civil side of things?

Dr. Gerard Dooly:

That is what I am getting to. Instead of these drones being controlled by an operator, they are sending them in a certain direction. Once they lose GPS and lose connection to the radio operator, the AI on board the drone, which costs maybe only €50, takes over and starts recognising targets on the flight path it was sent on. Now there is no radio connection or operator and the drone is actually in charge.

James Geoghegan (Dublin Bay South, Fine Gael)
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Dr. Dooly gave the example of bird conservation. Is that right?

Dr. Gerard Dooly:

Yes.

James Geoghegan (Dublin Bay South, Fine Gael)
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What other areas could he see this being deployed in that would be understandable in an Irish context?

Dr. Gerard Dooly:

Mainly what they are doing currently in Ukraine is getting the drones to recognise supply vehicles like trucks and stuff. They are targeting trucks behind the front line.

James Geoghegan (Dublin Bay South, Fine Gael)
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Dr. Dooly explained how the technology, as it is developing in a war context, has implications for what is happening here in Ireland. He gave the example of bird conservation. What are the other areas where that field of robotics could have application here?

Dr. Gerard Dooly:

What I am getting to is there is obviously a security issue here, if you have drones that can target people or items without an operator. We procured or are procuring anti-drone technology. Mostly the line of defence there is radio waves. It is trying to detect the drone via radio and trying to block that radio signal. If we are dependent on that for our security, looking at what is going on at the forefront of research in Ukraine, there is then an issue with our defence and the anti-drone collision stuff that we are trying to procure.

James Geoghegan (Dublin Bay South, Fine Gael)
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That is fair. Maybe I will follow up and ask the question in another way later. I will turn to Professor Toal because I have only a very short period of time.

Professor Daniel Toal:

If I could just make one point------

James Geoghegan (Dublin Bay South, Fine Gael)
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No, I literally have 50 seconds.

Professor Daniel Toal:

I am sorry.

James Geoghegan (Dublin Bay South, Fine Gael)
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Professor Toal is the founding director of the centre for intelligent systems and robotics. His big statement is we need a new national centre for marine and aerial field robotics. If I read his statement correctly, he is saying that in order to do that we have to build a national field robotics centre. Which Department would have the responsibility for establishing this national centre? Who builds the national field robotics centre and what type of budget are we talking about here?

Professor Daniel Toal:

I have discussed that with a number of politicians, including an Taoiseach and the Minister for science, technology and research. The first part of the Deputy's question is, in part, a political decision. It could and will link very strongly with defence. It can also link very strongly with our renewable energy requirements due to the need for all this offshore infrastructure for offshore wind. It can also link directly with the Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine because of everything to do with fisheries and protecting our environment all the way out to 30° west. I could pitch for one of those but I could be wrong. At the moment, you might think the choice should be defence because that is the hot topic. I hope that in two years' time all the current wars are finished and we go back to a war that was more recognisable four years ago, in which case, if we are linked to defence, we might find we are budget-strung. It is possible for such national centres to be funded by government. In Norway, all things marine are linked through an agency that is across government departments.

I am sidestepping because I think it is a political decision but I have explained why. What was the second part of the Deputy's question?

James Geoghegan (Dublin Bay South, Fine Gael)
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In fairness, Professor Toal gave a good answer to both questions. There will be a follow-up afterwards so I will ask then.

Malcolm Byrne (Wicklow-Wexford, Fianna Fail)
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There will be a minute for quick questions afterwards.

Paul Murphy (Dublin South West, Solidarity)
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I thank the witnesses for coming before us. I will pick up on one thing. When we heard from human rights experts about this, the main thing they rang alarm bells about was autonomous weaponry of various sorts presenting a fundamental challenge to human rights. There is the potential for discrimination and all these things. When Professor Toal was asked about autonomous systems, he said something about anything he is involved in always has a human on the loop as opposed to in the loop. However, in the opening statement, he states that heterogenous autonomous systems are precisely what the Defence Forces, Naval Service, Air Corps, Coast Guard and An Garda Síochána need. Is there a contradiction there or am I missing something?

Professor Daniel Toal:

No. On heterogenous systems, if you go to sea and your drone has a half hour capability, and you go with an autonomous surface vessel with the drone on board, there are multiple robots or a subsea robot from a surface vessel. If that is linked with the Coast Guard, the navy or fisheries, that might be tied back to a mother vessel, which could be a naval vessel, a Marine Institute vessel or a research vessel.

Paul Murphy (Dublin South West, Solidarity)
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Are they autonomous or are they not autonomous? Does Professor Toal say that autonomous systems are precisely what these organisations need?

Professor Daniel Toal:

There were various kit experts who came to this. They can be autonomous but if Ireland signs up, like it has done with the Convention on Cluster Munitions and many other treaties - politicians will be likely to sign us up - to international agreements, these will leave human responsibility in effectively all autonomous systems in that scenario. That is my belief and that is what I think would be correct.

Paul Murphy (Dublin South West, Solidarity)
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Is Professor Toal saying we precisely need autonomous systems or we do not precisely need autonomous systems?

Professor Daniel Toal:

The Deputy is using the word autonomous, but autonomous systems can still have human oversight.

Paul Murphy (Dublin South West, Solidarity)
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That is what I am trying to get at. Is not the whole definition of autonomous that it does not necessarily have oversight?

Professor Daniel Toal:

No. I do not mean absolutely fully autonomous where they are operating by themselves. If you have some Mars rover operating on Mars, there is a 40-minute delay so you cannot have the human pilot controlling it in real time, but you can have the human pilot controlling it at the command mission level.

Paul Murphy (Dublin South West, Solidarity)
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Okay. The Professor spoke earlier about the need to grow what he described as our defence sector. Would he see the CRIS as part of a growing military-industrial complex in this country?

Professor Daniel Toal:

No.

Paul Murphy (Dublin South West, Solidarity)
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Why?

Professor Daniel Toal:

We are at this committee because this committee is focused on AI and defence and Ireland needs AI and defence. We have not been committed to developing robotics for military applications.

Paul Murphy (Dublin South West, Solidarity)
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Some of the organisations Professor Toal works beside are. Professor Toal positively referenced A-techSYN, which explicitly creates target drones for military use and he is involved in work with it.

Professor Daniel Toal:

We also all fly in Boeing planes and Boeing makes a large portion of the missiles that are used in various conflicts.

Paul Murphy (Dublin South West, Solidarity)
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Therefore, Professor Toal is integrated into this network of companies that are involved in military use.

Professor Daniel Toal:

As is everybody who buys an air ticket and climbs on board a Boeing.

Paul Murphy (Dublin South West, Solidarity)
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Does Professor Toal not think there is a difference? He is involved in helping to develop the technology-----

Professor Daniel Toal:

No. We are not developing technology for weapons systems. Some of the tension will arise with dual use. Dual use is effectively anything that can have a non-military application and a military application.

Paul Murphy (Dublin South West, Solidarity)
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Yes. Professor Toal develops technology that may be used, even if it does not involve the shooting bit, in drones that do the shooting.

Professor Daniel Toal:

That is also true for anybody involved in developing car technology and the automated driving of cars.

Paul Murphy (Dublin South West, Solidarity)
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Sure. However, I think there is a moral distinction between someone flying on a Boeing plane and developing technology that goes into it. It is a question of policy whether we should be supporting this.

Professor Daniel Toal:

I disagree. If you are involved in automotive research for autonomous driving, that is exactly the same technology you put in a tank.

Paul Murphy (Dublin South West, Solidarity)
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I was not disputing that comparison but the earlier point about buying an air ticket. In any case, Professor Toal talked about the national field robotics centre, which is his big takeaway from this.

Does Professor Toal envisage partnerships between that centre and companies that are part of what he calls the defence sector and I call the military-industrial complex?

Professor Daniel Toal:

Personally, no. To some extent there is a governance aspect. We brought forward this proposal and got feedback from the Department of Further and Higher Education, Research, Innovation and Science. One of the areas it wishes us to further develop is governance. That is a governance aspect that has to be thrashed out. It is not choice for either of us, but if it is nationally funded, it will have to be addressed in that development.

Paul Murphy (Dublin South West, Solidarity)
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Finally, is there any collaboration by CRIS with Israeli organisations, academics or companies?

Professor Daniel Toal:

I will give one exception. We are involved in a deep sea mining project in which we are developing technology in deep sea mining. There is an Israeli partner for the publicising of research results. That was brought to our attention by the research office a number of years ago and, looking at and analysing the company involved - it is a PR-type company - we proceeded, with UL clearance. Within our group we have committed that we jointly do not wish to partner in any European project that has Israeli partners at the moment. That is not a directive from UL; it is an agreement between the researchers involved who applied for the research funding.

Keira Keogh (Mayo, Fine Gael)
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I thank the witnesses. I spotted in Dr. Dooly's opening statement that low-cost retrofit models at just €50 could multiply existing drone effectiveness. I am wondering about this from a terrorism perspective because we are working at trying to get countries to sign up to the treaty to agree there will always be a human in the loop. How are we looking at that in relation to defence and terrorism?

Considering Ireland's exclusive economic zone and current subsea infrastructure, how do the witnesses think we can build our domestic capability in autonomous systems for defence? What level of surveillance is needed? What are realistic timelines for us to get to where we need to be?

Dr. Gerard Dooly:

I will make a comment on the first point. What we were talking about was the add-on of AI-enabled autonomy. There are two levels of autonomy and, when we spoke earlier about autonomous systems, I am not sure whether that came across clearly in my earlier responses. The first level is when people enter GPS co-ordinates and follow a path with a pilot overseeing the drone. The second level is moving the decisions for the path plan to the robot. We engage in the first level, which is oversight of autonomy. We develop machine learning capability to detect different things in imagery, be it red, green, blue, RGB, cameras, hyperspectral cameras or light detection and ranging, LiDAR cameras, but what is going on in warfare at the moment is AI-enabled autonomy, which is the second level. What has happened in recent years is the operationalisation of these assets, moving the decision-making to the robot. That is the threat I was trying to raise. It is what is happening currently. It is a change that has happened in the past 18 months. It is a current threat that the committee, and the Irish as a whole, should draw attention to.

The second point relates to our offshore area and being able to do our border security and fisheries protection. We spoke earlier about defence. Defence is also fisheries protection and border security and we need robots or AI-enabled systems, perhaps not AI-enabled robots, but systems that can alert an operator to things. They are just aids to the robotic platforms. We worked on a project funded by Enterprise Ireland in border security operations using long-range drones. That is kind of what we proved and demonstrated through projects like that, and there is significant interest.

There should be capabilities out there that Ireland can procure that would sit alongside the manned systems that Ireland is currently updating and procuring.

Keira Keogh (Mayo, Fine Gael)
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I thank Dr. Dooly. Did Professor Toal want to come in?

Professor Daniel Toal:

I have one small addition. The Defence Forces has significant skill in dealing with improvised devices because of past history in Ireland but also because of its activity in peacekeeping, and having to deal with mines or terrorist-developed technologies rather than military complex-developed capabilities. To some extent, that threat also exists with drone technology. If non-government actors get involved in whatever campaigns and start using this technology in a malign way, our Defence Forces need to be able to deal with that scenario too, if it ever occurred nationally or internationally in peacekeeping. We have proven in the past, in regard to previous technology versions, that Ireland is committed to and capable in that space.

Keira Keogh (Mayo, Fine Gael)
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I was thinking that we have seen an increase in recent years of people driving cars into crowds, whether that is at Christmas markets, marathons, football matches or different big events. I was thinking about the autonomy of the global positioning system, GPS, co-ordinates. That €50 technology that could be a huge risk was spoken about.

Professor Daniel Toal:

Yes. It is a sort of case in point. It would be possible, with autonomy, to lock out the cockpit of a modern commercial aircraft to avoid a repeat of anything like 9/11 but there are many reasons where if you open such a capability, you also open it to malign actors. To some extent, you could maybe provide a lock-out capability for cars but it is a technically, politically and ethically complex issue. What is possible technically is not what we always proceed with.

Malcolm Byrne (Wicklow-Wexford, Fianna Fail)
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Gabhaim buíochas leis an Teachta Keogh. It now falls to me. Our committee's role is mainly to make recommendations to the Government around the roll-out of AI. In regard to our recommendations, the recommendation around a national field robotic centre will make a lot of sense, certainly in respect of support for our universities with regard to framework programme ten and that there will be support provided there.

We are specifically looking at cyber and defence. As the witnesses will know, in the second half of this year Ireland is holding the Presidency of the EU. We will also be hosting a meeting of the European Political Community. The witnesses will have been aware, during the Danish Presidency, that there were a series of drone attacks. Attribution will be questioned but I think everyone is pretty certain they came from Russia. We knew during President Zelenskyy's visit that there has been a challenge in terms of drone attacks and we have seen drone attacks on the Baltic states, Poland and Finland emanating from Russia as well.

Talking, as Dr. Dooly did, around what has been happening in Ukraine, could he maybe assess what he would perceive as the potential threats to Ireland during that six-month period, which is crucial? What actions should we be taking as a State in order to counter either those drones or other hybrid attacks?

Dr. Gerard Dooly:

Speaking to that point, this issue came up several times, I am sure. Ireland has gone to procurement for anti-drone equipment, both from an Army perspective and that of An Garda Síochána. When you look at those underlying technologies, they come out after a number of years of development by, say, defence agencies. I think our primary procurement is coming from some French companies. The threat for AI-enabled systems has only existed for the past 18 months to two years. There is a likelihood that a lot of the anti-drone systems that exist on the market are based on radio frequencies so it is about trying to block those radio frequencies but also maybe primarily using those radio frequencies for targeting. If our systems are based on that, there is obviously a risk that the issue or the threat is not radio-based. It could be AI-enabled systems, so then that is a threat that maybe the State needs to look at.

Malcolm Byrne (Wicklow-Wexford, Fianna Fail)
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Given the focus there will be in Ireland during the second six months of this year, how likely is such a threat to materialise and are we prepared for it?

Dr. Gerard Dooly:

We are prepared for detection with regard to the anti-drone systems that we are procuring but it depends on the threat that comes. I do not know. I cannot surmise what the threat-----

Malcolm Byrne (Wicklow-Wexford, Fianna Fail)
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Dr. Dooly is correct in terms of the technology moving on quite a bit but what is the probability of an AI-enabled drone threat happening - I am thinking of some of the modern drones - and it being a grey attack? Is he confident in terms of the technology that this is what we are procuring?

Dr. Gerard Dooly:

I am an academic. I can advise on the technologies that are in existence across different jurisdictions. I can advise from a research perspective about what we have developed and what is capable from those research perspectives but I cannot-----

Malcolm Byrne (Wicklow-Wexford, Fianna Fail)
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I appreciate that but in terms of the capabilities, what should Ireland be prepared for?

Dr. Gerard Dooly:

Regarding the drone threat from an AI-enabled drone, obviously if I have a radio signal emitter that can block the radio or I can use that for detection, that gives me quite a wide area of coverage that can detect a drone maybe 30 km away via radio waves or even further. When that is gone, the drone is much more difficult to detect so it comes down to radar-based systems, depending on whether there is enough of a large area for the drone to give off a radar wave, or it comes down to optical-based systems such as hand and tilt cameras with high zoom. The capability of those systems might be in the order of a couple of km for drones - maybe 2 km to 3 km as opposed to the radio-based systems, which were 30 km to 40 km, so the capabilities that exist to counter AI-enabled drones are much more limited.

Malcolm Byrne (Wicklow-Wexford, Fianna Fail)
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I appreciate this is on the basis of Dr. Dooly's professional opinion, but we are exposed essentially and we need to make sure we have the necessary technology in place pretty quickly.

Dr. Gerard Dooly:

Technology during warfare moves at quite a rapid pace and that is what is going on. Technology is changing, even in terms of what we talked to earlier concerning traditional radio-based operation of drones to optical fibre-base to AI-enabled systems. It is changing rapidly so it is hard to procure equipment that can counter that on an effective basis.

Malcolm Byrne (Wicklow-Wexford, Fianna Fail)
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That is certainly quite concerning, particularly given some Russian activity we have seen in recent years and in terms of ensuring the State is sufficiently prepared for the potential threats.

Johnny Mythen (Wexford, Sinn Fein)
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The witnesses work with drones and robotic systems and work with multinational partners and non-EU countries. How would they prevent the sharing of data or intelligence in order to protect the security integrity of the country?

Professor Daniel Toal:

Most of our research is non-military or non-defence, for example, environmental protection and inspection for offshore wind. We do not share the control technology we develop for our vehicles in all our European projects. In the US, one can protect software with patent but one cannot do so in Europe. The way we protect our software is through patent. We get funded to participate in demonstration of capability but we do not-----

Johnny Mythen (Wexford, Sinn Fein)
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Could Professor Toal repeat what he said about the US?

Professor Daniel Toal:

One can patent algorithms or software in the US but one cannot do so in Europe. Most of the codes in our advanced development systems that we have developed are proprietary and are not shared.

We integrate systems in delivering the experimental results but we do not share the code. We publish the results of the capability and general approach but we do not share the code. We do that for commercial reasons, not really for defence and security reasons, but it overlaps into the same thing. It is like the control software in the flight cockpit of a commercial aircraft, which cannot be accessed through the Internet. You cannot log on through the Internet and log into the flight computer on a commercial aircraft. It is for very similar reasons. There is a very strict requirement for security and defence. We have significant cybersecurity researchers within a separate group in UL. We have implemented end-to-end cybersecurity with real-time flight control of underwater robots, as it turns out, that were deployed in Dubai and also in Newfoundland. We had a pilot in Limerick flying a robot that far away, with video link over and back, and with protection and encryption, what we call bump-in-the-wire protection and encryption of the data both ends, so nobody could break in.

Dee Ryan (Fianna Fail)
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The witnesses have outlined very clearly the evolution of AI defence and security and cybersecurity, which is our theme today. We have heard about the evolution of drones, AI-enabled drones and where we are going with technology. Is there a role for robotics in counteracting that and protecting the State against this type of hybrid threat?

Dr. Gerard Dooly:

A lot of my research, what we do in CRIS, relates to the development of machine learning and machine vision applications. We were working on a European grant, rolling out drones and autonomous surface vessels in partnership with companies and entities across Europe. The main entity was the Hamburg Port Authority. We were trying to move from manual-based, in-field operators that do, say, bridge monitoring and inspection to drones and autonomous surface vessels that would do the inspection in an autonomous manner. That was obviously with a pilot working remotely in the Hamburg Port Authority----

Dee Ryan (Fianna Fail)
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What about countering these AI-enabled drones?

Dr. Gerard Dooly:

As part of that, we looked at embedding drones into airspace, which is known as U-space. This falls into transport and mobility. Part of the issue is having on-board detect and avoid. For last-minute deconfliction within, say, UAS mobility, be it large drones, passenger drones or small drones, we have to have on-board detect and avoid. We developed machine learning algorithms for those detect-and-avoid systems. That does encourage the monitoring out to around maybe 6 km.

James Geoghegan (Dublin Bay South, Fine Gael)
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I am sorry that we are cutting the witnesses short. It is not a reflection on the information they are giving; it is just because of how much time we have available to us. It has been very interesting. I am going to conclude with Professor Toal. If I understood him correctly, he said he has had some engagement with the Taoiseach in respect of his proposal for the establishment of a new national centre for marine and aerial field robotics, and that there was some discussion around the various Departments. He mentioned the Norwegian model. I think he said he has got feedback from the Department of Further and Higher Education, Research, Innovation and Science. Is he gaining currency in his proposal? Where is this going and what is the process? How necessary does Professor Toal consider the establishment of this centre to be, feeding in with the maritime strategy and all the other things we are dealing with? Without a centre like the one he is proposing, how would Ireland compare? Are we an outlier in that we do not have what he is calling for?

Malcolm Byrne (Wicklow-Wexford, Fianna Fail)
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Very succinctly, please.

Professor Daniel Toal:

We are definitely an outlier, especially since we have such large ambition with the size and scale of our offshore tech areas, offshore wind, cables under the sea and so on. We are very much an outlier in that we do not also develop all this marine technology. The first part of the Deputy's question was in relation to the traction we have gained.

James Geoghegan (Dublin Bay South, Fine Gael)
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Yes, with the Taoiseach, the Department of Further and Higher Education, Research, Innovation and Science, etc.

Professor Daniel Toal:

The review that has come back from the Department of further and higher education is very positive but does not really answer this because the defence strategy will come up with answers by the end of the year and it does not want to prejudge that. The Department wants us to do more development on the governance side and the interaction with the agencies, specifically to see how that would work with the Naval Service, the Coast Guard, the Commissioner of Irish Lights, the Civil Defence, fisheries, etc. We are very much an outlier internationally. Belgium, France, the UK, Germany, Denmark, Norway and Sweden all have such sensors.

James Geoghegan (Dublin Bay South, Fine Gael)
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I thank Professor Toal.

Paul Murphy (Dublin South West, Solidarity)
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Earlier we spoke in the abstract about dual use technology and the fact things the witnesses develop may be used for military purposes but they are not specifically developing things for military purposes. Concretely, is anything they have developed being used by foreign militaries and, if so, which ones? Perhaps the witnesses do not know whether it is foreign militaries but they will know if armaments manufacturers have used it.

Professor Daniel Toal:

The short answer is "No". Nothing our group has developed is being used by militaries anywhere.

Paul Murphy (Dublin South West, Solidarity)
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What is the witnesses' involvement in the EU marine robotics organisation? Is CRIS a partner?

Professor Daniel Toal:

There are two things called "EU marine robotics". One is an annual conference, which we have hosted and I have chaired, where all the European-funded projects in marine robotics come together to share their research. There is a separate EU marine robotics association which has a membership fee.

Paul Murphy (Dublin South West, Solidarity)
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It has nothing to do with the conferences.

Professor Daniel Toal:

No.

Paul Murphy (Dublin South West, Solidarity)
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On the conferences, in 2023 there was involvement of a researcher from Israel and in 2024 there is mention of options for research in Israel and Croatia, with great stipends available. Are Israeli companies or researchers still involved in the conferences?

Professor Daniel Toal:

The conference we hosted in 2023 was IEEE, which is the largest engineering institution globally. It is American but it has sub-areas all around the world. It holds conferences in America every year and it holds a conference that alternates between Europe and the Pacific Rim. We hosted that in 2023. It has been in Aberdeen three or four times. It is everything to do with ocean engineering. It is everything from oil and gas through to wind. It is not a defence conference. As for some of the people who attend because of the use of robotics, when you host a conference like that visa issues are used as the vetting net, as well as the threads of the topic you are running the conference on. We are not checking people's CVs for the area of research they are in, unless there is a security flag or something that comes through visa and other areas.

Paul Murphy (Dublin South West, Solidarity)
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I thank Professor Toal.

Malcolm Byrne (Wicklow-Wexford, Fianna Fail)
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Thank you, Deputy. My final question is on the future of the technology. I certainly get the witnesses' point about how autonomous robotics will retain a human in the loop. However, with the development of agentic AI, we are going to move to a situation where robots are set a task. How do we ensure we can maintain the human in the loop in that era? Related to that, it is one thing when it is a state-controlled robot but what about when this technology falls into the hands of non-state actors? How do we respond?

Professor Daniel Toal:

There is only enough time for one of us. Dr. Dooly can go ahead.

Dr. Gerard Dooly:

From a regulation side, we are all mandated through IASA to follow the regulations. AI-enabled drones or robots are not permitted. We are all mandated just to have autonomous vehicles, not AI-enabled vehicles.

Malcolm Byrne (Wicklow-Wexford, Fianna Fail)
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You are regulated but what happens when it falls to people who do not care about being regulated?

Dr. Gerard Dooly:

With AI-enabled robots, the capability is out there. You can build them from scratch. It is fairly straightforward to have this capability in bad hands.

It is up to State agencies to create defences around that, be those detection systems or monitoring systems.

Professor Daniel Toal:

I will jump in. The Irish Defence Forces are very good with IEDs, or improvised explosive devices. With AI systems, or whatever you want to call them, the defence and security and the cybersecurity organs of the State and the semi-States would have a very strong role there. That is a developing area. The State needs to counter the non-government or malign operators who may use such technology. A national lab would help to support that but it might not be the key player.

Malcolm Byrne (Wicklow-Wexford, Fianna Fail)
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All right. Gentlemen, thank you very much. It has been a really useful session. With the agreement of the committee we might write to the Department of Defence in light of the evidence simply to receive reassurance about the potential threats Ireland will face. The Department might not tell us, for security reasons, what it is doing but it could assure us it is addressing those issues. That could be a practical input. Thank you again and please feel free, if anything comes up at the committee, to contact us and let us know. As I said, our recommendations will go to the Government.