Gerard Craughwell (Independent) | Oireachtas source

To leave aside the jokes and get down to the serious issues, AI has the capacity to rapidly evolve cybersecurity risks within our country. Not only is our country suffering from these, so too are countries right across Europe. The level of cyber awareness that exists within populations is desperately and deeply worrying, as is the replication capacity of AI. We saw just today in The Irish Timesthat a teenager was responsible for cyberattacks in this country. That is just frightening.

Many will know I have put together an expert group that meets in this House from time to time. Recently, we established a common statement or vision for cybersecurity in Ireland, and that vision encompasses AI. Many Departments are already using AI to some degree. I have some concern about the rush to regulate. While we will try to regulate, we will be one step behind the criminals using AI whether we like it or not. Therefore, it should be exploited for all of its worth and we should learn what criminals are likely to do with it once they get their hands on it. Believe me, they are working on it at the moment.

There is a misconception that criminals involved in cyberattacks and the use of AI are super-gurus when it comes to IT. They are not; they are people who get lucky. They have a specific algorithm they are able to work on, or they buy the cyberattack software on the dark Web.

At a recent conference, we were talking about customer service and the obligation of those supplying goods and services to provide quality goods. If you buy cyberattack software on the dark Web and it does not work, there is nowhere to go with it. However, this is something we need to be extremely serious about.

In our own Parliament, there is a question over the CCTV systems and the use of Chinese hardware. Has this House been observed from outside? Who knows? This is something we have to be aware of. In the United States, TikTok is now banned. We have got to decide in this country whether we want to go the same way.

Very recently we had the director of the National Cyber Security Centre before our committee. One of the problems hindering the centre right now is the lack of legislation. There are all sorts of things to be considered when talking about legislation that will govern not only the use of AI but also cyber defence in this country. At the end of the day, it is very difficult. Senators Byrne and O'Loughlin are correct that systems are moving forward at a pace and that it is extremely difficult for a government ever to get ahead of them. Back in the days when I was teaching information technology, one of the issues we had was that hardware was finding it hard to keep up with the development of software. We are going to run into that as AI takes over. The types of machines needed to run AI are going to be pretty enormous.

Senator Byrne referred to the large companies that have a vested interest in AI and everything to do with it. At a conference I attended, Google spoke about its vision to be the educator of the world – because you could access anything you wanted on Google – until somebody questioned whether Google was censored in China. Of course it is.Therefore, it is not free and open when it comes to these things. The truth of the matter is that these large companies have a vested interest. We are now negotiating with the likes of Meta as if it were a nation rather than just a company. This is deeply worrying. The owner of X, Elon Musk, is being called into parliaments to outline where he sees AI going. This is deeply concerning to me. We should be using our own experts, not relying on the expertise of major multinationals with a vested interest in ensuring governments move their way.

I am delighted today, after nine years of calling for the establishment of a national intelligence and security group, that the Tánaiste has announced we are about to put in national intelligence. We are the only Parliament in Europe that does not have an intelligence sub-committee to examine and oversee intelligence in the country. The move is really good.

I am delighted to see that, under the leadership of the Minister of State to a certain degree, the National Cyber Security Centre is about to move into its new premises. It is increasing its staff number. Funding is the main issue for it. We have got to see it funded as much as possible. I am running out of time.