As the first head of MI5 to be publically named, Dame Stella Rimmington reshaped how the public viewed the service she had served in for three decades
When Dame Stella Rimington died in August 2025 at the age of 90, tributes poured in for a woman who had not only shattered several glass ceilings, but who had also redefined the very architecture of British intelligence. As the first female director general of MI5 – and the first to be publicly named – Rimington’s tenure from 1992 to 1996 marked a huge shift in the culture and visibility of the UK’s domestic spy service.
In 1967, while accompanying her diplomat husband on a posting to Delhi, Rimington was tapped on the shoulder – quite literally – by an MI5 officer and asked if she fancied “helping out” in his office. She began as a typist, but by the time she returned to London in 1969, she had joined the service full-time and began climbing its rigid, male-dominated ranks.
Over the next two decades, Rimington worked across all three operational branches: counter-espionage, counter-terrorism, and counter-subversion. Her career coincided with some of the most fraught chapters in British security history – from Soviet infiltration and IRA bombings to controversial surveillance of trade union leaders and left-wing activists. As assistant director of the Inter-Departmental Group on Subversion in Public Life, she was even tasked with monitoring ‘subversives’ in the civil service. She later admitted MI5 may have been “a bit over-enthusiastic” in its Cold War domestic snooping.
Her appointment as director-general in 1992 was historic not just because of her gender, but for the decision to publicly name her, a radical departure from MI5’s tradition of anonymity. The move was part of John Major’s “open government” initiative, and designed to divert attention away from the lack of women in his Cabinet. It was a PR victory for the prime minister but a personal shock for Rimington. She hadn’t been consulted, and the media frenzy that followed – including the publication of her home address – forced her to relocate for safety.
Yet Rimington leant into the imposed openness and used it as an opportunity to modernise MI5’s image. She oversaw the agency’s first-ever press photoshoot and published a public-facing booklet to demystify its operations. In the words of the historian Dr Helen Fry: “Stella was a catalyst for major change within MI5 in bringing about more openness with the public and overseeing the first release of its files into the National Archives at Kew [...] She began the modernisation of the service and contributed to the greater level of transparency that exists today.”
In 1994, Rimington delivered the Dimbleby Lecture, aiming to dispel widespread myths about the service. Her profile was raised even further with the release of GoldenEye in 1995. Although James Bond famously works for MI6 not MI5, many – including Rimington – believed that Dame Judi Dench’s portrayal of Bond's boss M was inspired by her.
Open Secret, the memoir Rimington published in 2001, was another first – and another controversy. Though carefully vetted and revealing little operational detail, the book drew ire from Whitehall traditionalists and intelligence insiders who felt she had breached the sacred silence of the service. Critics accused her of vanity and self-promotion, but Rimington defended the book as part of the transparency she had championed during her tenure.
Reviews of the autobiography were mixed. While some praised its insight into the bureaucratic and cultural challenges of MI5, others lamented its lack of juicy revelations.
After retiring, Rimington forged a second career as a novelist, penning a series of spy thrillers featuring fictional MI5 officer Liz Carlyle. Though her fiction wasn’t exactly cutting-edge, it offered a rare glimpse into the procedural rhythms of intelligence work from someone who had lived it.
Although Rimington and her husband John had parted ways in the 1980s, in 2020 they reunited under the same roof during the Covid-19 lockdown. “It’s a good recipe for marriage, I’d say,” she said. “Split up, live separately, and return to it later.”
Rimington died in August 2025, aged 90. Her record in government is a reminder that security leaders must be comfortable with two trades at once – quiet operational mastery, and the louder work of securing public trust.