Andrew Parker, head of MI5 warns of the damage done through leaking GCHQ documents
Andrew Parker, Director General of MI5 made his first speech since taking over as head of the Security Service in April, warning of the damage done through leaking documents from GCHQ. Following this, former No.10 adviser Sir David Omand said he assumed data leaked by Edward Snowden was being analysed by Russia and China, making this breach worse than that by the Cambridge spy ring in the 1950s.
Perhaps the most notorious double agent in British histroy was Kim Philby, former head of MI6 and part of the group of officials who met in Cambridge University and passed on information to the Soviet Union in the 1950s. In The Graham Greene Triolgy (1993), Arena interviewed Philby as he recalls his encounter with writer Graham Greene, who ended up in the Secret Service after signing up for the National Service aged 36. Deemed an inappropriate candidate for the army, Greene's papers were sent over to the Secret Service and fell into the hands of none other than Kim Philby.
Arena interviews former head of MI6 Kim Philby on his encounter with writer Graham Greene
Arena: The Graham Greene Trilogy (1993), Directed by Donald Sturrock, Series Editor - Anthony Wall
For more on the history of spies, take a look at Adam Curtis' blog post 'Bugger', which features the unedited rushes of Kim Philby's funeral in Moscow back in 1987
