Issue State threats the most connected risk, with 11 links to acute risks

Summary

In the report's impact mapping, state threats have the largest total number of direct connections when incoming and outgoing impacts are combined. This is mainly because of their many direct impacts on acute risks, 11 in all, including biological and conventional military attacks on the UK. The report also points to less visible links, such as using emerging financial systems to get around economic sanctions. Its chapter on emerging financial systems likewise explains that distributed ledger technology can bypass the effect of traditional sanctions on foreign states. The supply chain chapter links state threats to the possibility that supply chains are weaponised as a form of economic coercion. The report believes such cross-cutting analysis can inform evidence-based policies that reduce several risks together.