How MI5 is adapting to fight coronaviruspublished at 09:51 British Summer Time 20 April 2020
Gordon Corera
Security correspondent, BBC News
As he prepares to step down after seven years of leading MI5, Andrew Parker speaks to the BBC about coronavirus, counter-terrorism and how the Security Service has changed since he joined in 1983.
Inside MI5 headquarters at Thames House, Andrew Parker concedes it is a strange time to be leaving the organisation he has led for the last seven years.
Like other organisations, the Security Service has had to rapidly adapt to a new, unexpected world in the last few weeks since the coronavirus pandemic hit.
The priority has been to maintain its operations so that the emergency services can focus on Covid-19.
"At this time - maybe even more than normally - it is vital that the nation's national security machine is working so that the national emergency we are in now isn't further complicated or compounded by other events," Mr Parker says.