Annie Machon is a former British MI5 intelligence officer, author, and public speaker. In 1996, she resigned from MI5 in order to help David Shayler reveal a series of alleged crimes committed by the agency. Afterward, they went on the run around Europe for a month, lived in hiding for a year and in exile for two, before returning voluntarily. Machon was never charged with a crime. Subsequently, she has become a media commentator, author, political campaigner, and international public speaker on a wide variety of geopolitical issues. She has also featured in a number of films and TV documentaries, including The Culture High, Digitale Dissidenten, and The Mole: Undercover in North Korea.
Machon in 2013
Machon at 30C3 in Hamburg, December 2013
The Security Service, also known as MI5, is the United Kingdom's domestic counter-intelligence and security agency and is part of its intelligence machinery alongside the Secret Intelligence Service (MI6), Government Communications Headquarters (GCHQ), and Defence Intelligence (DI). MI5 is directed by the Joint Intelligence Committee (JIC), and the service is bound by the Security Service Act 1989. The service is directed to protect British parliamentary democracy and economic interests and to counter terrorism and espionage within the United Kingdom (UK).
Thames House, London
Part of Thames House
Recognising service at home and abroad protecting the United Kingdom
Dame Stella Rimington, the first female Director General of MI5