Maritime security is vital to international peace and security. The maritime domain underpins global trade, communications, food supply, and energy security. It is also home to some of the world’s most critical infrastructure, from subsea cables to offshore energy installations. And for that reason, disruption at sea often has dramatic effects back on dry land.
At its core, the logic of maritime security has not changed. We need to know who is doing what and where, which activities pose a threat and how best we can respond. But the technological environment in which our lives are enmeshed is evolving rapidly, with new risks and new opportunities emerging every day.
Shifting tides in maritime security
- New technologies are lowering the barriers to projecting power at sea.
Small, cheap and increasingly autonomous systems can now threaten much larger vessels and pose a serious risk to critical infrastructure. Once the preserve of sophisticated navies, these capabilities are becoming increasingly accessible, including to non-State actors. While UNIDIR research found just one attack using an uncrewed maritime system in 2019, the annual figure had risen more than 2,000% by 2024. We can expect that upward trajectory to have become even steeper in 2026.
- The oceans are becoming more transparent.
Artificial intelligence, satellites, advanced detection systems, fibre-optic sensing and the automated fusion of varied data streams are transforming our awareness of activity at sea, both above and below the surface. But greater transparency also has strategic consequences, especially where concealment is of paramount concern, as with submarine-based nuclear deterrence.
- The maritime and digital domains are becoming increasingly interdependent.
Maritime operations today rely on digital systems, and the digital economy depends on physical infrastructure at sea. More than 99% of data moving between continents travels by subsea cable. And with today’s ports operating as complex digital ecosystems, a successful cyberattack on a single vulnerability within them can be enough to paralyse a whole web of global supply chains. Interdependence creates new vulnerabilities. And disruption in one domain can quickly cascade into others. - Maritime insecurity is being fuelled by illicit trafficking in conventional arms.
This trafficking exacerbates armed violence, organized crime and conflict, as well as undermining the effective implementation of Security Council arms embargoes and other international arms control measures. For this reason, maritime security and conventional arms control should be viewed as mutually reinforcing objectives.
- Our international instruments are not keeping up with the new world we live in.
The United Nations Register of Conventional Arms, for instance, does a good job of building trust through reporting on conventional arms transfers, including warships. But armed, uncrewed maritime systems may fall outside the scope of the Register’s technical descriptions and definitions of what constitutes a “warship”, which focus on tonnage and missile or torpedo range. As maritime capabilities evolve, multilateral arms control frameworks need to evolve with them.
Priorities for action on maritime security
These five trends point directly to three clear priorities.
The first is resilience, for States and for industry alike.
The maritime domain is too vast and interconnected to be secured by better protecting every vessel, port, cable or offshore installation. Some disruption is inevitable.
Maritime security must, therefore, involve the ability to anticipate threats, absorb shocks, restore essential functions and adapt. Since much of this infrastructure is operated by commercial actors, public-private cooperation will be fundamental here.
The second is a renewed focus on illicit arms movements.
Numerous international frameworks and instruments address the illicit transfer, diversion and trafficking of conventional arms.
Strengthening these agreements would help create a virtuous circle where a more secure maritime domain leads to better maritime governance, which in turn facilitates more effective implementation of arms control commitments.
The third is sustained and systematic attention, particularly from the Security Council.
The Council has led the way on ensuring structured engagement on cross-cutting issues with lasting peace and security implications. Maritime security warrants the same treatment. This work could and should be founded on continuous scanning of the technological horizon to pick out new developments that will reshape risks and opportunities at sea. The recent establishment of the Informal Expert Group on Science and Technology also represents a positive and meaningful step towards integrating the security implications of emerging technologies into the full range of the Council’s activities. UNIDIR and its dedicated maritime security workstream naturally stand ready to support the work of the Council and the wider international community.
New technologies may be lowering the barriers to projection of power at sea, making our oceans more transparent and interweaving our maritime and digital systems. But with the right approach, we can keep pace with these changes, build resilience and ensure that the seas we depend on remain safe, secure and stable in the years and decades to come.
