These are tough times for Liz Truss. After resigning on October 20 after just 44 days as prime minister, British media claim her mobile phone was hacked when she was foreign minister.
Sunday’s mail Unidentified security sources quoted an article published on Saturday as saying that former Prime Minister Liz Truss’s personal smartphone had been hacked “by agents suspected of working for the Kremlin.” According to the weekly, they had access to “top-secret exchanges with international partners.”
Sensitive talks about Ukraine
“We don’t comment on people’s security arrangements,” a government spokesman responded before adding that “robust systems are in place to protect against cyber threats.”
British opposition MPs on Saturday called for an investigation into the case. “It is essential that all these security issues are investigated and addressed at the highest level,” opposition Labor MP Yvette Cooper said.
“We need an independent emergency investigation to uncover the truth,” said Liberal Democrat MP Layla Moran.
A source told the newspaper that the “compromised” phone was placed inside a locked safe in a government secure location after messages had been hacked for a year, including “highly sensitive discussions” about the war in Ukraine.
The hack was discovered this summer when Liz Truss was foreign secretary and campaigning to become leader of the Conservative Party and prime minister, the newspaper said. She claimed “the details were suppressed” by then-Prime Minister Boris Johnson and Simon Case, her top political adviser.
Responsible Russia?
“It takes some time to find out who is behind these kinds of attacks, but Russia tends to be at the top of the list,” a source interviewed by the newspaper said.
The Russian military said on Saturday it repelled a massive drone attack on its fleet in annexed Crimea’s Sevastopol Bay that it blamed Ukraine and the United Kingdom and damaged a ship. Russia has also accused London of having participated in the sabotage of the Nord Stream 1 and 2 gas pipelines in the Baltic Sea in September.
The British Ministry of Defense reacted by denouncing “false information” intended to “divert attention”, while a Ukrainian official suggested that “careless handling of explosives” by Russian forces at the origin of the incident was at risk.
The incident report comes as Home Secretary Suella Braverman was reappointed by Prime Minister Rishi Sunak following her resignation due to a security breach. She has declared send a confidential document to a Member of Parliament via their personal email.
Source: BFM TV
