This interim report identifies a significant opportunity for collaboration between the United States and the United Kingdom and proposes a framework for coordinating efforts to secure frontier artificial intelligence (AI) development. The goal is to provide a practical, actionable approach to elevating AI security to a level commensurate with assets of strategic national and international importance.

Advancing U.S.–UK Cooperation to Secure Frontier Artificial Intelligence

Brianna Rosen, Kyle A. Kilian, Matthew J. Malone, Benjamin Etheridge, Tiffany Saade

ResearchPublished Jun 8, 2026

This interim RAND–Oxford Programme for Cyber and Technology Policy report identifies a significant opportunity for collaboration between the United States and the United Kingdom and proposes a framework for coordinating efforts to secure frontier artificial intelligence (AI) development. The goal is to provide policymakers, national security officials, and frontier AI laboratory leaders in both countries with a practical, actionable approach to elevating AI security to a level commensurate with assets of strategic national and international importance. The report makes the case for bilateral cooperation as the most-effective means to harmonize protective controls, enhance threat intelligence-sharing, and build security interoperability across U.S. and UK AI infrastructure.

The proposed analytical framework organizes AI security into five domains—access and interfaces, development and supply chain, monitoring and response, personnel security, and physical security—each mapping to real-world threat vectors. This modular structure allows both governments to prioritize the highest-impact protections, adapt to evolving risks, and coordinate capabilities without requiring wholesale organizational changes across the AI industry. The clusters address technical practices and policy interventions in parallel, translating shared security objectives into coordinated bilateral action.

Key Takeaways

Bilateral cooperation is the most-effective means to harmonize protective controls, enhance threat intelligence-sharing, and build security interoperability across U.S. and UK AI infrastructure

  • Effective bilateral cooperation requires a shared framework to coordinate actions without duplicating efforts or imposing conflicting requirements on industry.
  • Bilateral AI security cooperation can leverage each country’s respective strengths, avoid duplication of effort, and maximize interoperability across the alliance.
  • Effective coordination can act as a security multiplier and position the alliance to lead and shape the global AI security architecture.

Coordinated engagement between governments and industry can help increase security without imposing burdensome regulations

  • By mapping security measures to domains in which the U.S. and UK governments already possess complementary capabilities, the framework enables risk-informed implementation of protections without requiring wholesale organizational changes across the AI industry or unduly burdensome regulations.

The proposed analytical framework organizes AI security into five clusters to address technical practices and policy interventions in parallel, translating shared security objectives into coordinated bilateral action:

  • Hardened access and interfaces
  • Secure development and supply chains
  • Monitoring, detection, and incident response
  • Personnel security
  • Physical and environmental security

Recommendations

  • Establish joint threat intelligence infrastructure for AI security.
  • Accelerate transatlantic hardware security research and development.
  • Coordinate supply-chain security and procurement guidance.
  • Extend government personnel security practices to frontier labs.
  • Expand bilateral support for red-teaming and model evaluations.
  • Conduct regular joint AI risk management and crisis exercises.
  • Establish common AI security standards and assurance frameworks.

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Rosen, Brianna, Kyle A. Kilian, Matthew J. Malone, Benjamin Etheridge, and Tiffany Saade, Advancing U.S.–UK Cooperation to Secure Frontier Artificial Intelligence. Santa Monica, CA: RAND Corporation, 2026. https://www.rand.org/pubs/research_reports/RRA4764-1.html.
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