Before she was prime minister for an inglorious 44 days, Liz Truss was the British Foreign Secretary under Prime Minister Boris Johnson. The equivalent in America would be Secretary of State, as in the nation’s top diplomat, involved in extremely sensitive diplomacy and working with tons of confidential information. During her time as foreign secretary, Truss got hacked, likely by Russia. The phone hack was covered up by the Johnson government because it came during the Tory leadership clownshow over the summer.

Liz Truss’s personal phone was hacked by agents suspected of working for Russian President Vladimir Putin, The Mail on Sunday can reveal. They gained access to top-secret details of negotiations with key international allies – as well as private messages she exchanged with her close friend Kwasi Kwarteng.

The hack was discovered during the summer Tory leadership campaign, when Ms Truss was Foreign Secretary, but the details were suppressed by the then Prime Minister Boris Johnson and the Cabinet Secretary Simon Case.

One source said the phone was so heavily compromised that it has now been placed in a locked safe inside a secure government location.

It is understood that the messages that fell into foreign hands included criticisms of Mr Johnson made by Ms Truss and Mr Kwarteng, leading to a potential risk of blackmail. They are also believed to have included highly sensitive discussions with senior international foreign ministers about the war in Ukraine, including detailed discussions about arms shipments.

In a statement released to the MoS on Saturday afternoon, a UK Government spokesperson said: ‘We do not comment on individuals’ security arrangements.’

But a source with knowledge of the incident said: ‘This caused absolute pandemonium. It is not a great look for the intelligence services if the Foreign Secretary’s phone can be so easily plundered for embarrassing personal messages by agents presumed to be working for Putin’s Russia.’

[From The Daily Mail]

I don’t doubt that Russia has hacked into the communications of other European and American leaders and diplomats, but one could argue that this situation was pretty unique, as Truss was truly making the argument at the time that she should be the next prime minister. Apparently, Truss was so stressed about it that Boris Johnson ordered a lockdown on information about the hacking at the time, so it wasn’t reported back in July and August, even though the press had some idea about it. Now that Truss’s 44-day reign of terror is over, there are calls for a wider investigation into the hacking AND the cover-up. I wonder if this was part of the reason why Boris Johnson dropped out of the most recent leadership race too – not so much this specific story, but the larger issue of Johnson’s involvement in tons of sh-t which wasn’t even reported in the British media at the time.

Photos courtesy of Avalon Red.