politics

February 28, 2026

UK accused of spying on Irish journalist

Britain’s MI5 intelligence agency persistently and illegally monitored the BBC’s Vincent Kearney, a tribunal has heard

UK accused of spying on Irish journalist

TL;DR

  • MI5 allegedly spied on Irish journalist Vincent Kearney for eight years, from 2006 to 2014.
  • Lawyers told the Investigatory Powers Tribunal that MI5 unlawfully accessed Kearney's phone records.
  • The PSNI and Metropolitan Police used geographic data from over 1,500 texts to create a detailed profile of Kearney.
  • MI5 admitted to accessing Kearney's phone records on two occasions in 2006 and 2009.
  • The BBC, for which Kearney previously worked, stated that the actions were wrong and must not be repeated.
  • Investigative journalists Trevor Birney and Barry McCaffrey were previously found to have been unlawfully spied on by the PSNI and Metropolitan Police.

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