The Liberal Democrats are calling for an inquiry into whether the new head of MI6, Sir John Sawers, should be allowed to take up his post after his wife apparently published personal details and photographs on the Facebook website.
Lady Shelley Sawers disclosed potentially compromising information, including the location of the London flat used by the couple and the whereabouts of their three children and of Sir John’s parents on the social networking site, The Mail on Sunday has reported.
The details, which were removed after the newspaper contacted the Foreign Office, also revealed the couple’s friendships with actors Moir Leslie and Alister Cameron.
Lady Sawers’ half-brother, Hugo Haig-Thomas, a former diplomat, was said to be among those featured in family photographs on Facebook.
Mr Haig-Thomas was an associate and researcher for controversial historian David Irving, who was jailed for three years in Austria in 2006 after pleading guilty to Holocaust denial, the paper reported.
Lady Sawers put no privacy protection on her account, allowing any of Facebook’s 200 million users in the open-access “London” network to see the entries, the paper said.
Senior politicians said the security lapse raised concerns about Sir John’s ability to take up his post as chief of the Secret Intelligence Service in November, giving him responsibility for Britain’s overseas spying operations.
Edward Davy, the Liberal Democrat foreign affairs spokesman, called on Gordon Brown to launch an inquiry into the matter.
ITN