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What a 110-year-old lemon tells us about espionage history

What a 110-year-old lemon tells us about espionage history

Washington Post02-04-2025

It's a classic line from a spy movie: 'Burn after reading.' For German agent Karl Muller, that advice would have really helped.
Muller, a spy who masqueraded as a Russian shipbroker and covertly traveled to England among a crowd of refugees in 1915, used pen nibs dipped in lemon to write invisible messages to his counterparts. He relayed his secrets in between lines of regular ink in what appeared to be otherwise unremarkable letters.

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