The deal will now mean GCHQ, MI6 and MI5 will use Amazon's AWS services. It is thought the new data agreement enables spies to share data more easily from field locations overseas. The deal will also enable the quick use of applications to spot and translate recordings.

       The cloud software will also enable the intelligence agencies to conduct quicker searches on each other's datastores.

       Although AWS is a sister company, the data stored on the database will not be available to Amazon, the Financial Times reports.

       Industry experts estimate the deal could be up to ￡500million to ￡1billion over the next 10 years.

       Jeremy Fleming, GCHQ director has stated the use of AI will take the agencies into the digital age.

       Both AWS and GCHQ did not comment on the story.

       The CIA signed a $600million (￡435million) agreement with AWS in 2013.

       This agreement was upgraded last year under a new deal with a consortium comprising AWS, Microsoft, Google, Oracle, and IBM.

       Admiral Mike Rogers, former head of the US National Security Agency, said: "It gives us speed, it gives us flexibility, and by being able to aggregate more data, it increases the possibility that you’re going to identify that needle in the haystack."

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       Despite being a US company, the cloud services will be based in the UK.

       This deal comes as the head of GCHQ said the number of ransomware attacks on British institutions doubled in the last year.

       Speaking to the Cipher Brief annual threat conference, Mr Fleming said: "I think that the reason ransomware is proliferating – we’ve seen twice as many attacks this year as last year in the UK – is because it works.

       "It just pays. Criminals are making very good money from it and are often feeling that that’s largely uncontested."

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       He also called for greater transparency for the link between criminals and hostile states.

       Mr Fleming added: “In the shorter term we’ve got to sort out ransomware, and that is no mean feat in itself.

       "We have to be clear on the red lines and behaviours that we want to see, we’ve got to go after those links between criminal actors and state actors."

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       Away from the deal with the UK's spy agencies, AWS also plans to sign data centres in New Zealand.

       An infrastructure region will be built in 2024.