kgb THROUGH-THE-WALL Spy camera

This is a Soviet spy camera designed to take photographs from one room into another through a hole drilled in the wall. It was designed and used by the KGB, the Soviet Union’s secret police (1954 to 1991).

This technique was often used to take compromising photographs of diplomats and other visitors, especially in hotel rooms. For example, an attractive female KGB agent could be photographed in a compromising situation with a married overseas visitor who could then be blackmailed into cooperating with the KGB. It is a technique known as a “honey-trap”.

Western visitors to the Soviet Union and the Eastern European countries on which it had imposed communist regimes had to stay in hotels operated by the state tourist agency, Intourist. Some of these were designed to have small rooms for KGB agents immediately next door to guest rooms. From these KGB rooms, they could closely monitor what was going on in the guest room using a hidden camera and hidden microphones.

It is possible to visit one of these hotels in Tallinn, the capital of Estonia. The top floor of the Intourist hotel there (now a commercial hotel) was occupied entirely by KGB staff who had a direct line to the KGB headquarters in Tallinn. Those offices are now a museum. All the staff of the hotel were required to report to the KGB.

This is the website of the KGB museum: HotelViru&KGB Museum-sokoshotels.fi

This is one of a number of artefacts we have acquired to help bring to life the history of totalitarianism.