The creators of artificial intelligence need to abandon their “tech utopian” mindset, according to the terror watchdog, amid fears that the new technology could be used to groom vulnerable individuals.

Jonathan Hall KC, whose role is to review the adequacy of terrorism legislation, said the national security threat from AI was becoming ever more apparent and the technology needed to be designed with the intentions of terrorists firmly in mind.

He said too much AI development focused on the potential positives of the technology while neglecting to consider how terrorists might use it to carry out attacks.

“They need to have some horrible little 15-year-old neo-Nazi in the room with them, working out what they might do. You’ve got to hardwire the defences against what you know people will do with it,” said Hall.

The government’s independent reviewer of terrorism legislation admitted he was increasingly concerned by the scope for artificial intelligence chatbots to persuade vulnerable or neurodivergent individuals to launch terrorist attacks.

“What worries me is the suggestibility of humans when immersed in this world and the computer is off the hook. Use of language, in the context of national security, matters because ultimately language persuades people to do things.”

The security services are understood to be particularly concerned with the ability of AI chatbots to groom children, who are already a growing part of MI5’s terror caseload.

As calls grow for regulation of the technology following warnings last week from AI pioneers that it could threaten the survival of the human race, it is expected that the prime minister, Rishi Sunak, will raise the issue when he travels to the US on Wednesday to meet President Biden and senior congressional figures.

Back in the UK, efforts are intensifying to confront national security challenges posed by AI with a partnership between MI5 and the Alan Turing Institute, the national body for data science and artificial intelligence, leading the way.

Alexander Blanchard, a digital ethics research fellow in the institute’s defence and security programme, said its work with the security services indicated the UK was treating the security challenges presented by AI extremely seriously.

“There’s a lot of a willingness among defence and security policy makers to understand what’s going on, how actors could be using AI, what the threats are.

“There really is a sense of a need to keep abreast of what’s going on. There’s work on understanding what the risks are, what the long-term risks are [and] what the risks are for next-generation technology.”