Peter Wright (MI5 officer)

Peter Wright
Born(1916-08-09)9 August 1916
Died26 April 1995(1995-04-26) (aged 78)
Cygnet, Tasmania, Australia
CitizenshipBritish
Australian
Alma materSt Peter's College, Oxford
OccupationIntelligence officer
Spouse
Lois Foster-Melliar
(m. 1938)
ChildrenThree

Peter Maurice Wright CBE[1] (9 August 1916 – 26 April 1995) was a principal scientific officer for MI5, the British counter-intelligence agency. His book Spycatcher, written with Paul Greengrass, became an international bestseller with sales of over two million copies. Spycatcher was part memoir, part exposé detailing what Wright claimed were serious institutional failures he investigated within MI5. Wright is said to have been influenced in his counterespionage activity by James Jesus Angleton, counter-intelligence chief of the US Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) from 1954 to 1975.[2]

  1. ^ "No. 45554". The London Gazette (Supplement). 31 December 1971. p. 9.
  2. ^ Cite error: The named reference independent-1617351 was invoked but never defined (see the help page).