The spy world is nothing new, as the profession has been around since before Alexander the Great. What is new, however, is how spies carry out their work as a critical component of hybrid warfare.
A spy’s assignment can be wide and varied. It could be infiltration of a target group through social engineering to gain trust, acting as a human intelligence eye to assess a society’s general mood and disposition, or maybe to manage a surrogate network. I think it’s safe to say that a spy’s work is never done.
In the murky world of intelligence, a turn of phrase, comment, or action can make or destroy reputations. Except, nowadays, it’s not only the spy who is at risk. Ordinary people are at risk thanks to digital subversion, which accounts for the vast majority of surrogate network composition in target countries.
Digital Subversion Is Also An Asset Recruitment Cover For Spies
Recruitment used to be a tricky business for spies. The cold war era of labor intensive recruitment has yielded to the high return, low-risk intelligence supplied through digital subversion. The traditional spy is becoming more like a tactical manager of multiple assets.
From Terror to Valor: Echoes and Shadows, available at your favorite digital bookstore
Managing surrogate groups and all the other tasks of a deep cover spy are the fresh face of aggressive intelligence operations. Imagine having cultivated relationships with media, local politicians, and business leaders through face to face networking? This used to be the apex profile of a spy.
Now, add on digital networks, social media group participation, and the targeting of individuals to sow a perception of trust. The ease of relationship building for the spy is as beneficial as the signal intelligence collated on their targets.
Spies Create Spies in Target Nations
Chances are, if a spy targets you; they will know more about you than your own mother on your first face-to-face meet. Recruitment can lead to spies creating spies. The Department of Justice in the United States recently indicted Song Wu, a Chinese national, for using deception to get classified technology relating to the US Aerospace industry.
The Engineer, by training, impersonated victims, and used complex deception strategies to obtain the technology via illegal means. As an engineer myself, I can tell you that social engineering tactics will make you a good identifier of them. To implement them is a different skill-set, so who trained him?
Friends Have Spies Too
The current shadow war has many echoes and shadows, where offensive actions take place, and often from the most unlikely of sources. In 2014, the then US Defence Secretary, Robert Gates, complained about French spies downloading the content of laptops belonging to key US business people, while in France.
I chuckled at this old article. Many years prior, the CIA had a Microsoft enabled backdoor into French government systems that the French found. The uproar from France was dramatic. Just last year, Spain expelled two of the US embassy staff on allegations of trying to bribe their intelligence agents.
While I chuckled at that one too, the range of operations, responsibilities and performance expectations of the modern spy is extreme. Part human intelligence, part signal analyst/hacker, part soldier, and part diplomat; the list goes on and on.
I am thankful that my military service was as bland as a cup of tea in the old barrack canteen. The life of a spy seems as risky as it is bland, where perception is everything and a past track-record, if discovered, means nothing. Sounds like a risky and lonely life to me.
About the Author
John is a versatile author known for his gripping fiction narratives in the thriller, action, and suspense genres. With a background as a journalist since 2016, and expertise in cloud technologies as an engineer; John brings a unique blend of storytelling prowess and technical acumen to his work.
