MI6 intelligence on counter- terrorism operations may have been stolen by a rogue Swiss official, it emerged last night.
Security chiefs in the UK have been warned that hugely sensitive information they provided to the NDB, Switzerland’s spy agency, could have been ‘compromised’.
Hundreds of thousands of pages of classified documents were copied by a senior IT technician for the NDB, which he then copied for himself on to portable storage devices carrying them away in a backpack.
Swiss officials believe the suspect intended to sell the stolen data and have alerted both MI6 and America’s CIA.
The information was shared between Britain, Switzerland and the United States and the CIA has also been warned about the risk.
The technician, whose name has not been made public, was arrested by Swiss authorities last summer.
He was later released from prison while a criminal investigation by the office of Switzerland's Federal Attorney General continues.
A European security source said it is believed the IT worker became disgruntled when he felt his advice on operating the data systems was not being taken seriously.
The technician downloaded hundreds of thousands, or even millions, of printed pages of classified material from the Swiss intelligence service's servers onto portable hard drives.
Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2242921/Swiss-spy-warning-Top-secret-MI6-counter-terrorism-intelligence-feared-stolen.html#ixzz2ECGO5ggt
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