The heads of Britain's intelligence agencies will give evidence to MPs in public for the first time in their history following revelations about their surveillance capabilities based on leaks by US whistleblower Edward Snowden.

Sir Iain Lobban, the director of GCHQ, Andrew Parker, the director general of MI5, and Sir John Sawers, the MI6 chief, will appear together in a session that will be broadcast live on the internet with a short time delay.

They will appear before MPs on Thursday 7 November as part of an inquiry by the intelligence and security committee into oversight of the UK spying agencies, following concern about the scale of mass surveillance.

It will be the committee's first open evidence session and the first time the heads of the three agencies have appeared in public together to talk about their work.

The hearing comes after the Guardian published a series of stories based on leaks by Snowden revealing GCHQ has been secretly tapping 200 subsea fibreoptic cables containing Britain's internet traffic in a programme of mass surveillance called Project Tempora.

It was announced after the committee acknowledged public concern "at the suggested extent of the capabilities available to the intelligence agencies and the impact upon people's privacy as the agencies seek to find the needles in the haystacks that might be crucial to safeguarding national security".

The committee, chaired by the former foreign secretary Sir Malcolm Rifkind, said the session would "give an insight into the world of intelligence, and the work the agencies do on behalf of the UK". But the heads of the intelligence agencies will not discuss operational matters in public, so they are likely to avoid discussion of Project Tempora during the open session.

"It represents a very significant step forward in terms of the openness and transparency of the agencies," the intelligence and security committee said. "The committee will question the agency heads on the work of the agencies, their current priorities and the threats to the UK.

"Among other things it will cover the terrorist threat, regional instability and weapons proliferation, cybersecurity and espionage. However, since this is a public session, it will not cover details of intelligence capabilities or techniques, ongoing operations or sub judice matters. The committee questions the agencies about these details in their closed sessions."

The session will last approximately 90 minutes. It will be broadcast on a short-time delay as a security mechanism to allow the committee to pause the broadcast if anything is mentioned that might endanger national security or the safety of those working for the agencies.