[vintermann]

The MI5 have explicitly given themselves permission to do illegal things. Makes sense when you consider that a good number of the people who willingly join it, probably are idiots who have watched too many Bond movies.

I suspect all secretive organizations, from mafias to lodges to intelligence services, get shaped by influx of pop culture ideas of what they do, more than they would like to admit.

Though, it's actually a good sign that they moved to get it into a bill (the "Covert Human Intelligence Sources (Criminal Conduct) Bill") rather than merely having it as an informal policy. Shows they're at least slightly worried about having to answer for their crimes one day.