Scottish MP Stewart McDonald says emails stolen by Russian hackers

Scottish MP Stewart McDonald has claimed his emails have been hacked by a Russian spy service.

The Scottish National Party (SNP) MP for Glasgow South told the BBC his emails were stolen and he feared they would be made public after he fell victim to a phishing scam.

Mr McDonald told the broadcaster the incident had occurred in early January when a hacking group believed to be linked to Russia’s intelligence services emailed him pretending to be a member of his staff.

After clicking on the document which was sent from the staff member’s actual email address, the MP entered his login details into a login page.

Several days later the same staff member informed Mr McDonald he had been locked out of his personal email account because of suspicious activity – and that he had never sent him the email with the login page.

Mr McDonald told the BBC he decided to go public to warn others of the risks and limit the potential damage as he waited to see what the hackers would do with the stolen material.