Jonathan Evans was Director General of the British Security Service MI5 from 2007-13. 

As head of MI5, Evans was one the British government’s principal advisers on national security threats including terrorism, cyber security and espionage and was a member of the Prime Minister’s National Security Council. He also led MI5’s work to ensure the security of the 2012 Olympic and Paralympic Games in London.

In the course of a long career in MI5 Evans worked as both an investigator and an operational officer on a variety of national security threats, specialising in counter-terrorism. He became the Director responsible for MI5’s International Counter-Terrorism work on 1 September 2001, ten days before 9/11.

Evans is a member of the House of Lords where he sits on the Cross Benches; a non-executive director of HSBC Holdings and of Ark Data Centres; an adviser to the leading UK cyber security company Darktrace, and an Honorary Professor at St Andrews University.