Microsoft, a major US tech company, announced that it increase its collaboration with European governments to combat cyberthreats, particularly by implementing AI-powered information collection.

In a blog post, Microsoft vice chairman Brad Smith stated that the company's new European Security Program "puts AI at the center of our work as a tool to protect traditional cybersecurity needs."

Aiming to deliver real-time intelligence about cyber threats to governments, the scheme will extend to the “27 EU member states, as well as EU accession countries, members of the European Free Trade Association (EFTA), the UK, Monaco, and the Vatican,” he added.

Microsoft said that the governments of North Korea, China, Iran, and Russia were responsible for breaking into European computer networks for espionage and other reasons. Using tools like ransomware, which encrypts data on victims' devices and demands payment to recover it again, thieves are extending their attacks in the meanwhile.

“We see 600 million attacks on our customers every single day, Smith told reporters in a briefing ahead of the blog post’s release, calling cyber defence a multi-billion-dollar expense for customers across Europe”. “AI systems can help detect and identify new forms of attack,” Smith wrote in his blog post.

But according to Microsoft, malevolent actors have used the technology for anything from target research to code creation and "social engineering," which is the practice of persuading human staff members to allow hackers access. Last month, Microsoft assisted European law enforcement in taking down vast tracts of digital infrastructure that were part of the Lumma "infostealing" network, which was collecting private data from victims' devices, including crypto wallets and passwords.

Smith stated that as part of a larger expansion of cooperation with European security agencies, representatives of the company's digital crimes team will be embedded with Europol's cybercrime specialists in The Hague in the future. Microsoft is working on cybersecurity as part of a larger initiative to expand its business in Europe.

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The push coincides with escalating trade tensions between the US and the EU, with many criticizing the strategic reliance of European businesses on US-made technology.