
Rossiya via AFP - Getty Images
A combination of video grabs from footage broadcast by Russian state-run television in 2006 allegedly shows a man, said to be a British spy, in a park outside Moscow collecting a fake rock being used as a high-tech version of the spy's traditional letter-box or dead drop in which agents can anonymously deliver or retrieve information.

RTR via Reuters
Russian television said there was a transmitter inside the fake rock.
In an embarrassing episode for the British security services, Tony Blair's former chief of staff has admitted that the U.K. used a fake rock to spy on Russia. Reuters reports:
In a television program aired on Russian state television in 2006, Russia's FSB security service accused Britain of using the gadget for top secret communications in Moscow, but London did not admit to the charge at the time.
Now Jonathan Powell, who was chief of staff to then Prime Minister Tony Blair, has confirmed the Russians were correct.
"They had us bang to rights," Powell says in a BBC documentary to be aired on Thursday.
"There's not much you can say. You can't really call up and say 'terribly sorry about that and it won't happen again'," Powell says. Read the full story.

RTR via Reuters
Russian television showed an X-ray of what they said was a transmitter in the rock.
Tony Blair's former chief of staff admits in a BBC documentary that Britain used a rock with communications equipment inside to spy on Russia. Msnbc.com's Alex Witt reports.


Russian spies are cuter...
Spy v. Spy?
How could it be?
I'm shocked I tell you. Just shocked.
.
Seems a little antiquated for 2006, eh chaps?
I keep thinking, what if a rock collector had of stumbled over the spy rock, picked it up and took it home for his garden. The British would have been upset and the poor Russian that took it home? Well he would have been a guest at a firing squad and the U.S. would get all the blame.
I saw the picture and thought they found like the Yeti or something. It looks like some weird hairy creature cause of the way they took the picture. Stupid spies.
I thought the exact same thing! more like bigfoot not 007 . . . . .
007? Looks more like Mr. Bean. Nice amatuer OP.
Gentlemen...
Kind of a non-story- the Bond girls used fake boobs a lot to lure HIM in!
Worked well - OK by me!
Hello all- does anybody know how to disable this "Post on Facebook " crap permanently?
Im terribly sorry you see. In fact in this matter I may simply jog on. Looks as though I may have been left dangling with my good friends Jhon Thomas . ; ]
Cheers
As far as I know, if the "post to my facebook wall" at the bottom of the comments is unchecked, it shouldn't post, unless you're logging via facebook.
Well, at least one of them is...
Max, Russian spys are cuter!
Yeah, I liked the redhead they deported back to Russia last year!
Yes, Hemi Man, she was hawt...
Nazis also had some hot women spies, like Russian born Marina Lee: http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2010/aug/26/russian-ballerina-nazi-spy-marina-lee
In the British Intelligence Agency it isn't about looks, it is about who can hide the rock and keep the Secrets safe... He was the only British spy who could fit the rock in his anus..
In the fourth photo you can see him hide it...
Guess they failed spying-101
Failed seems a bit presumptuous. The article didn't say how long the device was in place or how much information it gathered. In any case, the Brits admitted it and that says "we got what we needed." Come on folks, it's a good spy story! Enjoy it.
im guessing the russions always gather around in parks around rocks to discuss sensitive information. oh just re read. its just a transmitter
You never know what's going to climb out from under a rock.
Awesome
lol....busted. Sarcastically speaking....Why would anyone ever need to spy on Russia? It's all fun and games until global war breaks out.
Nice looking rock. If I was a Russian citizen wandering through the park, I'd probably pick it up and take it home.
Hahahaha!!
Nice. Liberals will hate this. Conservatives will love it. Liberals will say we shouldnt be doing this around the world. Conservatives will love it and see it as a nation proactively protecting itself. It's just good to know this is going on and has been for many years. The English just got caught.
I'm a liberal and I like this. Looks like that blows your theory all to hell.
No dumbass liberals will say the spying is ok we need it but why show a photo of a spy tool which should be kept secret so it can be used again.
just reminds me the world is ran by paranoid sociopaths.
who wouldnt find that awesomely hilarious?
Well as this is a Brittish spy issue I don't see how democrates or republicans fit into this picture, but ok. I am liberal and I think its hilarious. Also I have to agree...Russian spies are cuter.
Liberals will say it causes global warming and the EPA will ban it.
Stpn2me.... who pissed in your Wheaties this morning? What the hell does this have to do with being a liberal or conservative? Have you been living under a rock or something? Lighten up, dude.
Marty:
Before you call others a dumbass read and really try to understand although we know it is a struggle for you to do so. Ths article states "THEY WERE CAUGHT" so I hardley think that the article 'outed' anything by taking a COPY of a photograph, aired in Russia on Russian T.V., and inserting it here. The true moron here appears to be yourself, what a knob, must make your mom real proud huh?
you people are so ignorant you are human beings and thats it. not liberal or conservative. every farce(foolish show, mockery, a ridiculous sham) name that you put on yourself is the first step in the brainwashing that has been going on in all aspects of our lives. until you can realize every made up name you put on yourself and others is nothing but a joke we will always be doomed to be thinking we are different and fighting amongst each other while the 1% sit and laugh at how ignorant you are.
@gamer4life...I think you forgot to take your meds.
gamer4life, right on. Our politicians are now like the Protestant and Catholic of Ireland a few years back. Fellow countrymen fighting over ideologue while agreeing on nothing.
This looks like the Rock & Roll method of spying.
The pictures aren't very Bond like, it appears more like John Belushi in Animal House sneaking into the deans building.
Just one of hundreds all over their country. Now, Iranians will be out turning over all the rocks around their sensitive areas, and they have more rocks than anyone.
gee, i hope no one puts a big rock around my sensitive area! ROFLMAO!!!!!!
OOPS!!!
it was an extraterrestrial asteroid. o___O
Leave no stone unturned!
Rock Center reporting on Rock Spying..makes sense.
How embarrassing
Still not as clever as putting a passive transmitter n the Great Seal of the United States in the Embassy in Moscow. Or a hundred and one other tricks the Russians played on the United States and Great Britian over the years. You'd laugh your self silly if I could tell you about some that we played and planted on them, but if I did someone would come and burn your house down.
Nothing embarrasses the British, They've had double, triple and quadruple spies and tricks since before the Russian revolution. They were instrumental in putting Lenin in power until Stalin upstaged them and him. You don't get to be a world power unless you have a strong spy network. Who backed down in the Cuban missile crisis. Kruschev was banging his shoes on the table about what he would do to America. Spies and spy planes such as the U-2 told Kennedy he couldn't cut the mustard. He crawled back to his Dasha with his tail between his legs sans a shoe. If you don't got um, you better get um. Stock in trade of all spy organizations is to make themselve look incompetent and stupid, that way they never know what hit them. I hear an Iranian scientist just blew himself up, the Mossad couldn't have done they are nothing but a bnch of Jew idiots. Hello.
The British couldn't decide between a Rock or a handset. Think about it.
gives me cause to wonder, how many and where are the spy rocks that have been placed in the U.S. not so much concerned about Russian rocks, more so Iranian rocks, or political gravel like demos and repubs, Yep, big brother is watching.
Boy boy,
This headline made my day!
Funny story, I guess it became public to embarrass the Brits.
L-O-L
This was news in 2006, and it was all over the news... so what is msn doing now? Recycling?
Not recycling...the Brits are only admitting to it now, so it's now a confirmed spy story.
Who took the picture?
A british spy, who was a double agent working for the Mossad and the CIA. It was our rock and the British had no right using it. They should have got their own rock. We had to drop the rock on their toe.
Your reply was really good NC I'm snore laughing on my seat!!!
I pictured a Russian spy laying in a field taking a pic of a British spy fumbling through a field looking for the spy rock. Yours was better NC.
shoulda used a fake snowman..
yeah Nikki, rock on...did I tell you guys about the H1N1 showing up at my sister's school in TX first in the US and then "miraculously" jumping straight to NYC?
Like I was telling our representative a couple years back, I was going by the area of the Governor's mansion in TX via that road that goes by white sands and there was a burning pickup with a horse trailer, and a guy with the horse he rescued out of it, on the side of the road at the top of the hill at white sands. I was only later to learn that that was the night that the governor's mansion caught fire; and I heard they saved the garage, so they couldn't collect on the banged up car inside.
Nothing new.
The CIA, FBI,ATF, HS, TSA, hey they all rock.
Looks like they got caught between a rock and a hard place. Sorry, I just couldn't resist.
It's only rock and roll, but I like it!
What is the big deal, we did it with a rock too. Palin said she could see Russia from her yard.
EJRAND has my vote for post of the week.
Yep, EJRAND had the quote of the day about rocks-in-her-head Palin.
....and the narcissist incompetent in the White House thinks we have 57 states.
That's strange, I thought she couldn't see past her nose from some of her statements and quotes. This is not directed against all women, but we went wrong when we taught some of them to speak. I've worked under a lot of women supervisors in my day and I found that seventy five percent of them just didn't have people skills. Some of them were beautiful women in terms of being a mother or a grandmother or a wife, but they just couldn't grasp that the people under them were none of these things. Sarah Palin comes off like this to me. If she were in charge we would all become her children, or grandchildren or last in line her husband. He reminds me of George Anthony under the thumb of Cindy Anthony. She was Governor of Alaska using this theme and now she's a back seat driver in the Republican Fiasco. Turn here Newt. Sit up straight Romney. If you other kids don't behave we're going to turn around and go back home.
Just because you're paranoid doesn't mean someone is not out to get you... Spying will always be around
The rock model was an upgrade from the log