Espionage, spying, or intelligence gathering is the act of obtaining secret or confidential information (intelligence). A person who commits espionage is called an espionage agent or spy. Any individual or spy ring, in the service of a government, company, criminal organization, or independent operation, can commit espionage. The practice is clandestine, as it is by definition unwelcome. In some circumstances, it may be a legal tool of law enforcement and in others, it may be illegal and punishable by law.
The Office of Strategic Services (OSS) was the intelligence agency of the United States during World War II. The OSS was formed as an agency of the Joint Chiefs of Staff (JCS) to coordinate espionage activities behind enemy lines for all branches of the United States Armed Forces. Other OSS functions included the use of propaganda, subversion, and post-war planning.
The Australian Secret Intelligence Service is the foreign intelligence agency of Australia, tasked with the covert collection of information overseas through personal contacts and other means of human intelligence. It is part of the Australian Intelligence Community and is also responsible for counter-intelligence and liaising with the intelligence agencies of other countries. ASIS was formed in 1952 but its existence remained secret within much of the government until 1972. ASIS is comparable to the American CIA and the British MI6.
The Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA) is an intelligence agency and combat support agency of the United States Department of Defense, specializing in defense and military intelligence.
Cold War espionage describes the intelligence gathering activities during the Cold War between the Western allies and the Eastern Bloc. Both relied on a wide variety of military and civilian agencies in this pursuit.
Oleg Antonovich Gordievsky, CMG is a former colonel of the KGB who became KGB resident-designate (rezident) and bureau chief in London, and was a double agent, providing information to the British Secret Intelligence Service (MI6) from 1974 to 1985. After being recalled to Moscow under suspicion, he was exfiltrated from the Soviet Union in July 1985 under a plan code-named Operation Pimlico. The Soviet Union subsequently sentenced him to death in absentia.
Spooks is a British television spy drama series that originally aired on BBC One from 13 May 2002 to 23 October 2011, consisting of 10 series. The title is a colloquialism for spies, and the series follows the work of a group of MI5 officers based at the service's Thames House headquarters, in a highly secure suite of offices known as The Grid. In the United States, the show is broadcast under the title MI-5. In Canada, the programme originally aired as MI-5 but later aired on BBC Canada as Spooks.
Alex Rider is a series of spy novels written by British author Anthony Horowitz. The novels revolve around a teenage spy named Alex Rider and is primarily aimed towards young adults. The series currently comprises fourteen novels, as well as six graphic novels, seven short stories, and a supplementary book.
A cover in foreign, military or police human intelligence or counterintelligence is the ostensible identity and/or role or position in an infiltrated organization assumed by a covert agent during a covert operation.
Operation Jungle was a programme by the British Secret Intelligence Service (MI6) early in the Cold War from 1949 to 1955 for the clandestine insertion of intelligence and resistance agents into Poland and the Baltic states. The agents were mostly Polish, Estonian, Latvian and Lithuanian exiles who had been trained in the United Kingdom and Sweden and were to link up with the anti-Soviet resistance against the communist governments. The naval operations of the programme were carried out by German crew-members of the German Mine Sweeping Administration under the control of the Royal Navy. The American-sponsored Gehlen Organization also got involved in the draft of agents from Eastern Europe. However, the MGB penetrated the network and captured or turned most of the agents.
The Central Intelligence Agency, known informally as the Agency and historically as the Company, is a civilian foreign intelligence service of the federal government of the United States, officially tasked with gathering, processing, and analyzing national security information from around the world, primarily through the use of human intelligence (HUMINT) and conducting covert action through its Directorate of Operations. As a principal member of the United States Intelligence Community (IC), the CIA reports to the Director of National Intelligence and is primarily focused on providing intelligence for the President and Cabinet of the United States. Following the dissolution of the Office of Strategic Services (OSS) at the end of World War II, President Harry S. Truman created the Central Intelligence Group under the direction of a Director of Central Intelligence by presidential directive on January 22, 1946, and this group was transformed into the Central Intelligence Agency by implementation of the National Security Act of 1947.
The Spy Who Came In from the Cold is a 1965 British spy film based on the 1963 novel of the same name by John le Carré. The film stars Richard Burton, Claire Bloom, and Oskar Werner. It was directed by Martin Ritt, and the screenplay was written by Paul Dehn and Guy Trosper.
This is a list of activities carried out by the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency in China.
Throughout the Cold War, the U.S. conducted operations focused on combatting socialism in Turkey, executed chiefly through Operation Gladio's Turkish branch, the Counter-Guerrilla. The Syrian civil war has seen a resurgence of CIA activity in Turkey in recent years.
The Intelligence Medal of Merit is awarded by the Central Intelligence Agency for performance of especially meritorious service or for achievement conspicuously above normal duties.
Operation Hardnose was a Central Intelligence Agency-run espionage operation spying upon the Ho Chi Minh trail that began during the Laotian Civil War. Started in Summer 1963, it soon attracted the attention of the U.S. Secretary of Defense, Robert McNamara. By December 1963, he was calling for its expansion. Operation Hardnose expanded and continued to report on the Ho Chi Minh trail even as American military intelligence activities mounted against the communist supply artery. In an attempt to adapt technology for use by illiterate Lao Theung, some of the U.S. Air Force's survival radios were modified by the CIA for use by their spies.
The United States Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) dates from September 18, 1947, when President Harry S. Truman signed the National Security Act of 1947 into law. A major impetus that has been cited over the years for the creation of the CIA was the unforeseen attack on Pearl Harbor, but whatever Pearl Harbor's role, at the close of World War II government circles identified a need for a group to coordinate government intelligence efforts, and the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), the State Department, the War Department, and even the Post Office were all jockeying for that new power.
Atomic Blonde is a 2017 American action thriller film directed by David Leitch from a screenplay by Kurt Johnstad, based on the 2012 graphic novel The Coldest City by Antony Johnston and Sam Hart. The film stars Charlize Theron, James McAvoy, John Goodman, Til Schweiger, Eddie Marsan, Sofia Boutella, and Toby Jones. The story revolves around a spy who has to find a list of double agents that is being smuggled into the West on the eve of the collapse of the Berlin Wall in 1989.
Sexpionage is the involvement of sexual activity, or the possibility of sexual activity, intimacy, romance, or seduction to conduct espionage. Sex or the possibility of sex can function as a distraction, incentive, cover story, or unintended part of any intelligence operation.
Redemption Day is a 2021 American action thriller film directed and co-written by Hicham Hajji. The film stars Gary Dourdan, Serinda Swan, Andy García, Martin Donovan, Robert Knepper and Samy Naceri and follows the U.S. Marine who travels to Morocco to rescue his kidnapped wife. It was distributed by Saban Films.
