A private intelligence agency (PIA) is a private sector (non-governmental) or quasi-non-government organization devoted to the collection, analysis, and exploitation of information, through the evaluation of public sources (OSINT or Open Source INTelligence) and cooperation with other institutions. [1] Some private intelligence agencies obtain information deceptively or through on-the-ground activities for clients. [2] [3] [4] [5] [6]
Private agencies have made their services available to governments as well as individual consumers; they have also sold their services to large corporations with an interest or investment in the category (e.g. crime, disease, corruption, etc.) or the region (e.g. Middle East, Vietnam, Prague, etc.) or to investigate perceived threats such as environmental groups or human rights groups. [7] [8] [9] [10] [11]
Some private intelligence agencies use online perception management, [12] social media influencing/manipulation campaigns, strategic disinformation [13] (such as fake news production/propaganda production [14] ), opposition research and political campaigns using social media and artificial intelligence such as Psy-Group, Cambridge Analytica and Black Cube. [15] [16] [17] [18] [19] The Atlantic Council's Digital Forensic Research Lab described the activity of Archimedes Group as practicing "information warfare". [20] Former anti-corruption prosecutor Aaron Sayne said private intelligence is "an industry that's largely undocumented and has very flexible ethical norms" as agencies collect and use sensitive information "for one purpose on day one and some completely contradictory purpose on day two". [21]
The private intelligence industry has boomed due to shifts in how the U.S. government is conducting espionage in the War on Terror. Some $56 billion (USD) or 70% of the $80 billion national intelligence budget of the United States was in 2013 earmarked for the private sector according to The New York Times' Tim Shorrock. Functions previously performed by the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), National Security Agency (NSA), and other intelligence agencies are now outsourced to private intelligence corporations. [22]
Disinformation is false information deliberately spread to deceive people. Disinformation is an orchestrated adversarial activity in which actors employ strategic deceptions and media manipulation tactics to advance political, military, or commercial goals. Disinformation is implemented through attacks that "weaponize multiple rhetorical strategies and forms of knowing—including not only falsehoods but also truths, half-truths, and value judgements—to exploit and amplify culture wars and other identity-driven controversies."
Eliyahu Ben-Shaul Cohen was an Israeli spy. He is best known for his espionage work in Syria between 1961 and 1965, where he developed close relationships with the Syrian political and military hierarchy.
The Israel Security Agency, better known by the acronyms Shabak or Shin Bet, is Israel's internal security service. Its motto is "Magen veLo Yera'e". The Shin Bet's headquarters are located in northwest Tel Aviv, north of Yarkon Park.
Isser Harel was spymaster of the intelligence and the security services of Israel and the Director of the Mossad (1952–1963). In his capacity as Mossad director, he oversaw the capture and covert transportation to Israel of Holocaust organizer Adolf Eichmann.
‘’’Unit 8200’’’ is an intelligence unit of the Israel Defense Forces responsible for clandestine operation, collecting signal intelligence (SIGINT) and code decryption, counterintelligence, cyberwarfare, military intelligence, and surveillance. Military publications include references to Unit 8200 as the ‘’’Central Collection Unit’’’, and it is sometimes referred to as ‘’’Israeli SIGINT National Unit’’’ (ISNU). It is subordinate to Aman, the military intelligence directorate.
The Institute for Intelligence and Special Operations, popularly known as Mossad, is the national intelligence agency of the State of Israel. It is one of the main entities in the Israeli Intelligence Community, along with Aman and Shin Bet.
Mehdi Ben Barka was a Moroccan nationalist, Arab socialist, politician, revolutionary, anti-imperialist, head of the left-wing National Union of Popular Forces (UNFP) and secretary of the Tricontinental Conference. An opponent of French Imperialism and King Hassan II, he was "disappeared" in Paris in 1965.
Wikistrat Inc. is a geostrategic analysis and business consultancy founded in Israel in 2010 by Joel Zamel and Daniel Green and headquartered in the United States. It describes itself as the world's first crowdsourced consultancy leveraging a global network of over 2,000 subject-matter experts. 74 percent of the firm’s revenue came from clients that were foreign governments such as United Arab Emirates and United States Government after which Deloitte is the biggest contributor.
Yosef "Yossi" Meir Cohen is a former Director of Mossad, the national intelligence agency of Israel.
State-sponsored Internet propaganda is Internet manipulation and propaganda that is sponsored by a state.
Black Cube is a private intelligence agency based in London, Tel Aviv and Madrid. The company was founded in 2010 by former Israeli intelligence officers Dan Zorella and Avi Yanus. Its employees include former members of Israeli intelligence units. In the past, it has supported Israel Defense Forces (IDF) activities.
Between 2010 and 2020, five Iranian nuclear scientists were killed in foreign-linked assassinations. Rezaeinejad was shot dead by gunmen on motorcycles, while Shahriari and Ahmadi Roshan were killed by explosives attached to their cars. Fereydoon Abbasi was also targeted in a car bombing, but survived.
Cambridge Analytica Ltd. (CA), previously known as SCL USA, was a British political consulting firm that came to prominence through the Facebook–Cambridge Analytica data scandal. It was started in 2013, as a subsidiary of the private intelligence company and self-described "global election management agency" SCL Group by long-time SCL executives Nigel Oakes, Alexander Nix and Alexander Oakes, with Nix as CEO. The well-connected founders had contact with, among others, the British Conservative Party, royal family, and military. The firm maintained offices in London, New York City, and Washington, D.C. The company closed operations in 2018 in the course of the Facebook–Cambridge Analytica data scandal, although firms related to both Cambridge Analytica and its parent firm SCL still exist.
NSO Group Technologies is an Israeli cyber-intelligence firm primarily known for its proprietary spyware Pegasus, which is capable of remote zero-click surveillance of smartphones. It employed almost 500 people as of 2017.
Russian interference in the 2016 United Kingdom European Union membership referendum is a debated subject and remains unproven, though multiple sources argue evidence exists demonstrating that the Russian government attempted to influence British public opinion in favour of leaving the European Union. Investigations into this subject have been undertaken by the UK Electoral Commission, the UK Parliament's Culture Select Committee and Intelligence and Security Committee, and the United States Senate. "The Russia Report" published by the Intelligence and Security Committee of Parliament in July 2020 did not specifically address the Brexit campaign, but it concluded that Russian interference in UK politics is commonplace. It also found substantial evidence that there had been interference in the 2014 Scottish independence referendum.
Joel Zamel is an Australian-Israeli inventor, entrepreneur, owner and operator of private intelligence and political analysis agencies which offer forecasting simulations, wargaming, influence operations, social media campaigns, private investment brokering and election campaign strategy. Such firms include Wikistrat, a geostrategic consultancy firm, Joel Zamel Investment Group (JZIG), White Knight, and Psy-Group, an agency specializing in counter-extremism activities and social media operations.
Psy-Group is a former Israeli private intelligence agency. It closed after revelations that it was under investigation by Special Counsel Robert Mueller.
Archimedes Group is a Tel Aviv-based private intelligence agency that has operated political campaigns using social media since 2017.
In 1999, the Intelligence Ministry of Iran arrested 13 Iranian Jews, accusing them of spying for Mossad. Security agents arrested 13 Jewish residents of the Iranian cities of Shiraz and Isfahan, including five merchants, a rabbi, two university professors, three teachers in private Hebrew schools, a kosher butcher and a 16-year-old boy, accusing them of spying for Israel. After a trial in Islamic Revolutionary Court, 10 were sentenced to 4–13 years in prison. The Israeli government and many U.S. Jewish groups and Jewish federations worldwide organized a pressure campaign globally against the Government of Iran, with demonstrations in front of Iranian embassies worldwide.
Emma L. Briant is a British scholar and academic researcher on media, contemporary propaganda, surveillance and information warfare who was involved in exposing the Facebook–Cambridge Analytica data scandal concerning data misuse and disinformation. She became Associate Professor of News and Political Communication at Monash University in Melbourne, Australia in 2023. Before this she was an associate researcher at Bard College and taught in the School of Communication at American University. Briant became an honorary associate in Cambridge University Center for Financial Reporting & Accountability, headed by Alan Jagolinzer, and joined Central European University, as a Fellow in the Center for Media, Data and Society in 2022.