Not letting gay people work for GCHQ until the 1990s was wrong and was the "nation's loss", the UK intelligence agency's boss Robert Hannigan has said. He also said the treatment of gay computer pioneer and code breaker Alan Turing had been "horrifying". GCHQ now relies on people who "dare to be different", he told a conference hosted by gay rights group Stonewall. Mr Hannigan said no-one could not know what some of those sacked for being gay would have gone on to achieve. In his speech in London, Mr Hannigan said a former spy he called Ian, who was forced out of the service on suspicion of being gay in the 1960s, had urged him to apologise.