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MI6 operatives and British special forces personnel were among more than 100 UK government personnel named in the leaked database that put as many as 100,000 people in Afghanistan at risk of Taliban reprisals.
Email addresses for British personnel were recorded in the case notes of Afghans they were sponsoring for relocation to the UK, according to a person with direct knowledge of the matter.
The identity of British spies and elite special forces troops is closely guarded to preserve their safety. The UK personnel affected by the colossal data breach had been briefed about it, the person said.
Britain’s special forces regiments are the Special Air Service, Special Boat Service and Special Reconnaissance Regiment.
A major general and a brigadier were also among scores of military and government officials named in the database as supporting applications from Afghans seeking sanctuary in Britain.
Matthew Savill, director of military sciences at Rusi, who spent almost two decades working at the MoD, said the names of British operatives should never have been included in such a spreadsheet.
“The identification of a named individual as employed in UK special forces or the [intelligence] Agencies is ordinarily handled as at least Secret,” he said. “If full names and special forces work are in the spreadsheet, that would constitute a breach of security rules.”
While an unparalleled “super-injunction” was discharged earlier this week, the High Court imposed another interim order that prevented the media from reporting the full severity of the data breach.
The Ministry of Defence sought, and obtained, a court order that made it unlawful for the press to describe the contents of a “case notes” column and other data that was included on the compromised database.
This included reporting that the last known location of applicants was among the data, an important detail that could have aided the Taliban tracing any individual they wanted to target if they obtained the list.
At a hearing before a High Court judge on Thursday, the MoD agreed to lift some of those restrictions.
Jude Bunting KC, representing the media organisations that were gagged, told the court that since the interim order had been imposed, “significant information” had been released that fell within the prohibited categories.
Defence secretary John Healey had already told parliament that “in a small number of cases” the “names of members of parliament, senior military officers and government officials were noted as supporting the application”.
Bunting said it was a “matter of surprise to the defendant that the secretary of state was able to report those details that the defendants weren’t”.
