Born in
London, Tovey was educated at
St Edward's School, Oxford,
St Edmund Hall, Oxford and the
School of Oriental and African Studies, where he studied modern Chinese. After national service in the
Royal Navy, Tovey joined
GCHQ in 1950. He was thus the first GCHQ director not to have worked at
Bletchley Park. He was knighted in 1980. Tovey's tenure as director at GCHQ was not an easy one: industrial action in 1981 led later to the banning of
trades unions from GCHQ. The decision was also taken to inaugurate the controversial
Zircon satellite project. Following his retirement from GCHQ, Tovey became a consultant advising firms including
Plessey on dealing with Government departments. He served during this time as the chair of the Joint Electronics and Telecommunications Security Export Control Committee (JETSECC) of the Federation of the Electronics Industry. Later he was the founding chairman of the UK
Mind Sports Olympiad, and Chairman of the Board of Directors of the Learning Skills Foundation Tovey maintained an interest in Italian art of the 13th to 17th centuries. He worked on a biography of the life and times of
Filippo Baldinucci. ==Personal life==