B

ond? You’re sacked. The spying industry worldwide has been hit by a massive crisis: Google. Entire divisions of secret service operatives have been made redundant by the super-slick search engine, I heard from reader Aber L., who works in security.

“Intelligence departments with massive budgets can now be replaced by any random kid with a talent for Googling,” said Aber. He forwarded to me an astonishing speech given earlier this month by former UK spy boss Sir David Pepper. Because of Google, spies are struggling to make sure they don’t produce intelligence which is “not secret at all,” Sir David admitted.

Typical agent mission before: “Get a fake passport, don a disguise, fly to Iran, hack into aircraft or satellite network, and get aerial pictures of nuclear facilities.”

Typical agent mission now: “Click Google Maps. Type Iran. Zoom. Print. Go for early lunch.”

Google had “raised the bar” for spies, another UK spy chief, Sir David Omand, recently told the UK Daily Telegraph. (How come both spy chiefs are called Sir David? Is it in the job description? “Applicants must be called Sir David.” If I change my name to Sir David, can I be UK spy chief?)

Google is amazing. Last week, on a speaking trip, I found myself hopelessly lost in an unfamiliar city. I called up Google Maps on my phone, but without much confidence: how can you read a map on such a tiny screen?

But the results were amazing. As soon as I typed in the name of the hotel I was looking for, Google detected where I was and drew a map from my square of pavement to the hotel door. Then it drew me as a blob (Hey, Google, I’m not that fat) floating on the map. As I walked along the pavement, the blob moved along the map on the tiny screen in my hand.

It seemed too good to be true. Then, 11 minutes later, the route turned left — into what looked like a dead end. Aiyeeah! What to do? In my head, a voice sounding like Alec Guinness spoke: “Feel the force, Luke.” I replied: “My name’s not Luke,” but decided to put my faith in Google. Your humble narrator walked straight towards the end of the cul-de-sac. Lo and behold, a tiny lane became visible to one side: yes, Google had led me to a neat short-cut to my hotel.

Anyway, I was raving about this to a techy friend named Des, who replied that Google’s impressive computer brain occasionally made embarrassing screw ups. He forwarded me four examples.

1) Someone used Google Translate to translate “Lady Gaga” from Malay to English. The Google computer said: “Britney Spears.”

2) Someone searched for “French military victories”. The computer responded: “Do you mean ‘French military defeats’?”

3) Someone searched for the phrase “she invented”. The computer responded: “Do you mean ‘he invented’?”

4) Someone searched for “anagram”. The computer responded: “Did you mean ‘nag a ram’?”

You know what? I don’t think these are mistakes at all. I think the Google computer is just toying with us. I don’t mind, as long as it remembers to call me Sir David from now on.

The writer is a columnist and journalist.