RUSI State Threats Taskforce (STT)
RUSI’s State Threats Taskforce (STT) aims to support the UK and its partners in detecting, understanding, attributing and responding to the spectrum of complex state threats currently facing democracies.
The rapidly rising threat posed by hostile state activity is complex and multi-faceted, yet all too often, the UK’s responses remain siloed.
Although not new, non-military state-led threats come in many and often hybrid organisational forms, bridging more specific threats such as malign cyber operations, state-based organised crime and the financing of anti-democratic activities. As noted in the UK’s latest Serious and Organised Crime Strategy, ‘The distinction between nation states and criminal groups in terms of cyber-crime is becoming frequently more blurred’.
The extent to which the UK government acknowledges these threats can be seen in the 2021 Integrated Review, the proliferation of 'Counter State Threat' policy units across Whitehall, and the activities of the National Cyber Security Centre.
With this heightened government focus in mind, in January 2023 RUSI, created a track 2 cross-disciplinary State Threats Taskforce (STT) that draws on the expertise of the Institute's Cyber, Organised Crime, and Financial Crime programmes to provide input into the policy debate at this crucial time.
Aims and objectives
As the UK’s 2021 Integrated Review notes, the UK ‘must improve [its] ability – and that of [its] allies and partners – to detect, understand, attribute and act in response to the spectrum of state threats’. It is to this mission that the STT intends to contribute.
Through a range of activities and other outputs, the overall objective of the STT is to deepen understanding of the specific dynamics of non-military state threats and offer ideas for realistic policy responses for both the UK and its allies.
Taskforce members*
The Lord Evans of Weardale KCB DL
Distinguished Fellow
Professor Mark Galeotti
Senior Associate Fellow; Principal Director, Mayak Intelligence
Jonathan Groom
Financial Crime Leader & Intelligence Executive
Tom Keatinge
Director, CFCS
Centre for Financial Crime and Security Studies
Rhianna King
Strategic Cyber Threat Intelligence Team Lead, SecAlliance
Dr Matthew Levitt
Director of the Counterterrorism & Intelligence Program at The Washington Institute for Near East Policy
Toby Lewis
Global Head of Threat Analysis, Darktrace
Jamie MacColl
Research Fellow
Cyber
Professor Heather Marquette
Professor of Development Politics, University of Birmingham
Carl Miller
Partner, CASM Technology
Professor Lynette Ong
Political Science & Munk School of Global Affairs and Public Policy, University of Toronto
Dr Liam O’Shea
Senior Research Fellow
Organised Crime and Policing
Alanna Putze
Senior Programme Manager
Centre for Financial Crime and Security Studies
Suzanne Raine
RUSI Trustee
Matthew Redhead
Senior Associate Fellow; Financial crime consultant and researcher
Kinga Redlowska
Head of CFCS Europe
Centre for Financial Crime and Security Studies
Stephen Reimer
Senior Research Fellow
Centre for Financial Crime and Security Studies
Melanie Smith, Head of Research, Institute for Strategic Dialogue US
Tim Symington
Visiting Senior Research Fellow, Kings College London
Louise Taggart
PwC Cyber Threat Intelligence, Senior Manager
Gavin Wilde
Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, Senior Fellow
Ollie Whitehouse
Founder, BinaryFirefly
* This is not an all-inclusive list of taskforce members
Related projects and programmes
TARIF aims to strengthen global democracy by identifying viable ways in which the UK and US can combine efforts in tackling illicit finance.
Euro SIFMANet brings together European research institutions to raise awareness and inform policymaking against the illicit financial flows that continue to undermine our democracies.
Analysing the types of cyber threats facing societies and identifying how to mitigate them.
