Vincent Kearney’s children once joked he was like James Bond because he refused to use their home telephone for work calls.The prominent Belfast journalist would go outside and speak on his mobile.“Even in the early days I was always so careful about what I said and texted, never used a landline,” says Kearney.On Thursday, the former BBC Home Affairs editor made legal history when he was awarded £20,000 in a UK tribunal after MI5 and the Police Service of Northern Ireland (PSNI) illegally obtained his phone records.It is understood to be the first time the British security service has been ordered to pay damages to a journalist.The Investigatory Powers tribunal (IPT) found the surveillance was “not in accordance with the law and disproportionate.”Vincent Kearney: 'I have very, very strong suspicions that MI5 were monitoring me on other occasions.' Photograph: Claudia Savage/PA Wire The extent of illegal spying was “staggering”, says Kearney.There were “thousands and thousands of pages of data” relating to seven named operations by police or MI5 operations between 2006 and 2018.“They weren’t looking at some phone numbers. They were hoovering up every single number that was in contact with me,” he adds.Kearney, now RTÉ Northern Editor, was first alerted to the surveillance two years ago by a solicitor involved in a separate case involving Belfast journalists, Barry McCaffrey and Trevor Birney.“I received a screen grab of four pages from [solicitor] Niall Murphy and it was quite clear when I read those pages that it was me being talked about, and my phone had been accessed. And those four pages have mushroomed since.”Confidential documents revealed that at one point the PSNI intercepted and monitored more than 1,500 of Kearney’s calls in a four-week period.“The amount of detail they gathered was astonishing,” he says.“All that data was geolocating people. If I was speaking to you and your mobile number came up, they were able to see where you were.“If you had a source who lived in a rural area, it was pretty easy for MI5 and the PSNI to identify who exactly your sources were.”The first authorisation MI5 sought from Kearney’s records was in 2006, when ex-Sinn Féin official and British agent Denis Donaldson was murdered in Co Donegal. [ MI5 and PSNI to pay damages to ex-BBC editor Vincent Kearney after accessing phone recordsOpens in new window ]“We can’t prove it but there’s a strong suspicion that they were probably monitoring my phone to see who I was talking to about the murder at that stage.”The full extent of the data gathering by MI5 – relating to the period between 2006 and 2009 – remains unknown.“Because I don’t know what that material is, that makes me more nervous,” adds Kearney.“I have very, very strong suspicions that MI5 were monitoring me on other occasions. They described me as a threat to national security.“That’s why the destruction order is really important. They’ve been ordered to destroy the material they gathered.”It emerged that intelligence material on his wife, four children and late mother-in-law – who was living with them at the time – was also being compiled.“Someone described it as if they were building a profile of me, my work and everyone I was in contact with.”There were occasions when Kearney considered quitting journalism due to the risk to his family.He singles out an incident following an interview with loyalist paramilitary leader, Billy Wright, when their home was targeted by masked men.His wife, Louise, was eight months pregnant at the time.“She woke up just after 2am and shouted to me that there were two masked men coming up our driveway, dressed in black from head to toe, walking towards the car.“I didn’t know what the intention was but I just put my head out of the window and yelled. There were threats from republicans as well and there another time the police moved us into a hotel with the kids.“We had the conversation if the job was worth it. Louise was always very supportive.”On a night out in a bar last year, Kearney was approached by a source just weeks after MI5 first admitted it had unlawfully accessed the communications data.Kearney recalls his shock when the source said: “You might as well have been an MI5 tout”.“I thought he was joking. I asked him what he meant and he said, ‘well, MI5 were tracking me because I was in contact with you’. He was absolutely furious.”Kearney referenced the incident in his witness impact statement to the tribunal.The emergence of the surveillance created a “chill factor”, he says.“Even though I had nothing to do with it whatsoever, all those sources would have blamed me if they were identified.“There was a real danger for public interest journalism. The bottom line is you’re only as good as your sources.“I’m lucky I’m at the stage in my career that I am. If I was starting off and this had happened in the first four or five years, it could finish a career. It would have made it much more difficult to get people to talk to you.”The tribunal’s ruling sets a legal precedent and represents more “than a slap on the wrist” for the security services, according to Kearney.“The fact that they had to pay out sends a message, particularly for MI5.“MI5 were operating in a world where everybody thought they were absolutely above the law, that they could do what they want without any kind of penalty. The same for the PSNI.“What I hope is that it will stop them doing again, or maybe think twice about doing it.”