Ssshhh… This is “For your eyes only”

We live in a dangerous world; there are terrorists, eco-nuts, liberals and Wacky Jacqui Smith looking to take away your personal freedoms and/or attack you at any time. I’ve often wondered about who is keeping Britain secure, and have even been having nightmares recently about the thought of Sarah Palin with her finger on the nuclear trigger. 

I’ve also been wondering how I can help to secure Great Britain, but drawn a blank. Obviously, I have some technical ability and a strong sense of pride in my country, but how can I possibly make a difference?

Well, thankfully, the answer arrived in an email a couple of days ago – and unfortunately got sent straight in my spam bin…

 

MI6/SIS Advert

 

It seems that Oxford and Cambridge are lacking in potential recruits for the security services. Now with the number of people attending university these days, you’d have thought that finding graduates with the requisite moustache wouldn’t be difficult, but it turns out that foreigners studying chemistry and middle-eastern politics doesn’t seem to sit well with the security services’ recruitment department.

So they turn to the likes of me. Now, I (used to) love my country dearly. As readers of this blog will know, I’ve contributed to parliamentary enquires, supported open government, and been a great campaigner for the use of technology to promote open government. And oddly enough, I seem to fit the advertised profile perfectly.

I have to admit, it would be nice to actually spy on someone else, rather than be spied on by your own country. In the early and mid-1990s, I worked on a number of defence projects that were marked UK/US Eyes, and yet over 10 years later, I’m under more surveillance by my own government than I ever was from the Russians.

Even given the above, it’s an alluring prospect; flash a “James Bond” ID card at the police, vodka martinis on expenses, and the chance of sleeping with Yiavonna Succabich…

Sadly, I’m actually a professional engineer, and so don’t qualify for entry into the rarefied strata of the security services. Professional engineers understand good security practices, and so I’ll present some questions that better reflect the current “State Of The Art” within the service…

 

Have YOU:

• Left any TOP SECRET papers on a train recently?
• Flogged a digital camera on eBay (complete with classified images)?

 

Can YOU:

• Leak like a sieve?

 

If so, MI6 could be just the place for you!!

 

I admit I’ve been very scathing of the UK security services in this post, so as a way of making amends and doing my bit for the defence of my nation, I’d like to offer some free words of advice to the security services (as this post goes through GCHQ); next time you let your operatives out of the office with a CD-ROM to leave somewhere in public, make sure it’s an ADA compiler. Hopefully someone from a hostile power will pick it up; It’ll set ‘em back at least 30 years…