The Herald

Spies come in from the cold as MI5 hints at its best-kept secrets

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MI5 HAS given a glimpse of where some of the UK’S biggest secrets are stored in its first post on Instagram.

The Secret Service launched an official account on the platform on yesterday in an effort to open up about its work and dispel some popular myths.

Revealing a photo from within the organisati­on’s London headquarte­rs, the first photo to be shared reads: “The secret to successful spying? Consider all angles. It’ll give you a better view ...

“This is the view our staff see as they enter

MI5 HQ in Thames House, London. Behind these pods lie some of the UK’S best-kept secrets.”

Home Secretary Priti Patel was among those to write a comment on the post, saying: “Thank you for your exceptiona­l work in keeping our country safe.”

MI5 plans to use Instagram to reveal never-before-seen material from its archives, as well as

promoting recruitmen­t opportunit­ies and hosting online Q&AS with serving intelligen­ce officers.

However, director general Ken Mccallum said the service would still need to keep many of its secrets so it can operate undetected in dangerous environmen­ts.

“The other half of the dilemma is that MI5’S ability to keep the country safe and resilient also depends on our reaching

out to others who can help us, and whom we in turn can help,” the Glaswegian wrote in The Daily Telegraph.

“We owe it to the public to be constantly striving to learn and improve; and in our fast-moving world, with technology advancing at incredible speed, it would be dangerous vanity to imagine MI5 can build all the capabiliti­es it needs inside its own bubble.”

 ??  ?? Director general of MI5 Ken Mccallum
Director general of MI5 Ken Mccallum

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