James Bond was never a good secret agent.
Let's face it, the guy used his real name continuously. He always had his cover blown early in the mission. He could only get information from the enemy when the enemy entrusted that information to a beautiful young woman (which seemed strangely frequent) and generally had to rely on the good guys showing up with substantial military force at the end to bail him out. In the process he managed to leave behind a trail of damaged, destroyed and abandoned high tech hardware for the enemy to collect and analyze. His success can only by explained by his penchant for going after the easiest of targets, independent organizations neither affiliated nor supported by any government, led by egotists who insisted on locating themselves in remote areas that could be conveniently attacked with military forces without incurring political consequence.
Here's what you need to know to do better.
Compartmentalization: You will generally not know all the assets contributing to the success of a venture. This is for their protection and yours. Deep cover assets, for example, will not be used for specific assignments. They are best employed as observers/reporters and occasional arrangers of benefits such as weapons or safe houses. Do not ask to make contact with them. They have seen all the Bond films and know that whenever Bond was told to "make contact with our man in..." that man ended up dead.
If you need their help, contact headquarters. If you need a safe house, for example, and one is available, you will be told to pick up an envelope at a drop, which will have an address and a key. This way, when you are captured and tortured, you will not be able to reveal the names of other agents in the area before your gruesome death. Even in the agency headquarters, things are compartmentalized. Analysts hand each other reports and don't bother asking where the original information came from.
Drop: A place where an agent picks stuff up or drops stuff off. A "live drop" has a live contact who will erify your identity with a pre-arranged code. (this is the "Squirrel flies at midnight" "Yes, but only when the moon is blue" stuff, its real.) A dead drop is only a location, generally hidden. It could be a locker in a public terminal, or a hole in a floorboard. The CIA used (and may still use) hollow spikes that were pushed
into the soil under a plant with one's feet. 2300 technology opens a whole new world of potential drops. Don't overlook "smart" dead drops- dead drops using technology to maintain security, or verify identities.
Safe house- a place where agents can be safe, more or less. Generally set up by one agent, used by others. A good one will be set up to blend in with agents' covers. Typically set up where no one would question short term occupants of the agent's appearance.
HUMINT: Human Intelligence: Intelligence gained the hard way, by direct observation, or contact with someone who has direct observation.
IMAGINT: Imagery Intelligence: intelligence gained though photography in visual, infra-red, or other spectrums.
SIGINT: Intelligence gained through analysis of electromagnetic signals
COMMINT: A subcategory of SIGINT, intelligence derived from interception of Communications
MASINT: Measurements and Signatures Intelligence. A term first coined in the late 20th century by the United States, referring to data gathered through a range of technical means, other than communications and signals intelligence. Examples could be detection of atmospheric emissions, sound, thermal signature etc.
VIRTINT: Virtual intelligence, intelligence gained through action across computer networks.
Weapons: In all but the most dangerous situations, these are White Elephants. If you use them, usually things have gone very wrong. What's worse, if anyone discovers you have one, its typically bye bye cover story, and you can expect things to go very wrong from there. As a result, the chief concern is how well you can hide them. In many situations, the risk of discovery outweighs any potential benefit. In other situations, think about how you can hide it, how you can get it in, and how you can get it out. Locally acquired weapons naturally avoid some of the get in/get out problem. Technology can be a benefit here, with weapons made from exotic materials that bypass scanners, or capable of being broken down into components resembling ordinary items. Crossbows fill the bill nicely at times, and high tech drugs loaded in the head make up for the lack of lethality compared with more modern arms. Other high tech crossbow loads are possible as well. If heavy firepower is really needed, consider it arriving with an agent in totally covert fashion, swimming ashore from a submarine, for example. This avoids the whole risky customs thing.
Diplomatic Immunity: A valuable asset to any national intelligence agency, use sparingly. Diplomatic Immunity is the ultimate get out of jail free card. If the other side respects it, if you get caught, the worst that can happen to you personally is expulsion. Wars can start, years of friendly international relations may be endangered, but you will not be harmed. Not only that, but you get to enter and leave a country without the normal customs search- the "diplomatic pouch" and a diplomats personal bags are inviolable. As a diplomat, you have ready access to the ultimate Safe House, the embassy. On the other hand (in the spy business there is always at least one other hand) having diplomatic immunity means you have only one
possible cover- diplomat- and as everyone knows this trick a diplomat might as well be wearing an "I am a spy' button on his lapel. You will be followed, observed, monitored, every chance the other side gets. Not only you but everyone you talk to will be under suspicion. In cities with clusters of diplomats (late 20th century New York and Vienna, for example) spy/diplomats spend most of their time keeping track of each other. One sneezes and 10 others check the handkerchief for clues. As a result, diplomats in the intelligence business will tend to be control and coordination points for others, or work very carefully to throw the constant monitors off their trail. For example, a common ploy is to have a number of
vehicles leave an embassy compound at once, overwhelming the other side's ability to follow them. Or, they restrict their intelligence activities to asking probing questions at official parties, building up a psychological profile of foreign leaders, while using sleight of hand to plant bugs, the technique of the 'tuxedo spy".
Communications
Always have a way of contacting the rest of the team, and higher headquarters. It doesn't have to be instant communications over radios, it just has to work. Signals can be as simple as a physical sign- abort the
mission if you see a red pillow on the couch. Remember, the more advanced the system, the better its capabilities, but the harder the time you'll have explaining it if you get caught. Communications devices are best disguised as things you would be expected to have on you anyway. In modern or future
environments, the personal communications device is already a common thing. But, the well equipped spy may carry one with special features like a "line of sight" capability, a "burst" capability (sending out a transmission in extremely compressed form to reduce the chance of interception) and encryption. On the other hand, having the only cell phone in the area that a surveillance team CAN'T intercept is bound to raise eyebrows. Indirect, well planned, creative low-tech communications can thwart high tech security.
"Squirting" and "Bursting"- Both refer to recording a message, then transmitting it in a very compressed, short format. The savings in time help avoid the communications source being located by the enemy.
For security, you cannot beat direct communications. To avoid interception of communications, employ face to face meetings, or line of sight methods, or runners/couriers. Other communications run the risk of being intercepted, so employ codes and ciphers.
Codes and ciphers: A cipher is a mathematical formula for encrypting information. A Code is a linguistic mechanism. (For example, if a message says "3 bears are fed" and you know that means "The minister of Finance is taking bribes", that is a code. If the same message is given as 943658277920110, from which the original message is obtained by the application of some formula, that is a cipher. Codes have no pattern to break, generally, but are much more limited and require a preset code vocabulary.
Ciphers are engaged in endless war between encryption and decryption, assume any cipher will be eventually broken. It might take years, but it will happen. Although the vocabulary is much more limited, codes allow you to use completely ordinary means of communication, in public, with no fear of interception. For example, you could use your portable phone, in a crowded area, in full view of the enemy's security goons, to remind Marsha to order a pizza- and pass a message. Do not use shoe-phones. They draw needless attention.
With Digitilization, encrypted messages can be placed in formats of any kind. For example, consider a picture- if you have digitized a "master" picture, messages can be incorporated into the picture through minor changes in the values of pixels. The message containing picture might look identical to quick inspection as the original, yet conceal many bytes of information. Sound recordings can conceal messages in the same way. future technology could allow messages to be contained in microscopic particles, or even the structure of proteins- an agent might carry a secret message in his blood!
Beyond today's horizon- future advances will make the amount of information storable in a small space vastly larger than todays capability. Security agencies will be sensitive to this, exploiting this technology while seeking to be protected from it. People exiting and entering sensitive areas may be briefly exposed to intense magnetic fields- harmless, but capable of destroying data on small, hidden recording devices.
Sensors: Bugs, cameras, and the like. First, sensors, especially remote ones, have to rely on communication- see all of the above. It might be handy to have a bug broadcast to a receiver 20 miles away, but then lots of other people could intercept the signal. on the other end of the scale, a device that saves data for manual removal is less obtrusive, but has its own risks. Think carefully about what you need. Advanced technology really opens up the world of sensors. Almost anything goes. You can detect minute changes in a person's skin temperature, figure the weight of a truck's cargo as it passes over a wire, see through tiny openings with minute 'borescopes". The options are so great as to beyond cataloguing. To get a handle on things, consider what easily collectable clues will settle certain questions. For example, supposing you wanted to know- are the trucks being used to smuggle out tantalum? You don't need to know if there are trucks, or what color they are, or what the driver looks like. You need to know
what is in the back of the truck, or you need to know the weight of the truck at various points. Direct observation of the back of the truck may be hazardous. Time for the wire sensor across the road trick.
Advanced technology can give us more autonomous sensors. Robotic devices can enter where humans cannot. tiny insect like units can carry cameras and receivers and ferry information back themselves, wormlike borescopes can tunnel through pipes and conduits. Sensors can be emplaced by air drop,
fired into position from a specialized gun (or crossbow) disguised as something harmless, or placed by hand.
Bionics can lead to the fusion of sensors, communications, and the body. Like everything else, yup, one mroe double edged sword. Bionics can give a character an incredible ace in the hole. Woe unto the character that is caught with it in the wrong place. Very bothersome is the fact that they are not removable. If the other side has a sensor system capable of detecting bionic systems, and a character has such a bionic system, leaving it home is not an option. Bionically installed features can also include data storage, interface systems, etc. Weaponry is generally a bad idea. The benefit of a bionic weapon is typically more than offset by the danger of exposure.
Assymetry: Never play to the other side's strengths. If the other side has technological abilities equal to or greater than your own, use low tech communications. If the other side has a network of supporters at the street level, use the most advanced technology available. If the other side is all muscle, outwit them. If they have one pencil geek all alone entrusted with all their sensitive information, don't be afraid to drag him into a dark alley and pound it out of him.
Work against the people, not the system: learn about and defeat your opponents as individual people. What does Abu really want out of life? What does he hide from his boss? His Wife? What does he fear? Most people will readily believe something they hear, if it is something they are already pre-disposed to believe. If Abu thinks Hamid wants to take his job, he will be open to planted clues that point to Hamid launching some sort of plot to displace Abu. This was the modus operandi of the Mission Impossible series.
Exposure: A bad thing. Your success as a special missions agent depends on the other side not only being clueless to who you are, but being clueless to the existence of your team.
Exchanges: The good news. Most Civilized nations are reluctant to execute spies. Spies are valuable, and as long as they are alive, they can be ransomed. A typical demand is the return of a spy in exchange. The bad news. Many of the places a spy will work in are not Civilized.
Some other terms;
Notional Agent- fictitious
or nonexistent agent, identified as a source for fabricated information or
cited as a source to protect the identity of the real source.
Aunt Minnie- Old
US term for photo from amateur or commercial source, that happens to have, by
sheer luck, intelligence value.
"In the background you can see the Mig-31 prototype, right over
Aunt Minnie's left shoulder".
Floater- person
used once or occasionally, possibly unwittingly.
Sterilize: to remove and marks, records, evidence, etc,
tying something with its actual nation of origin. In an era of sophisticated chemical and technical analysis, this
is much harder.
"Flaps and Seals" CIA Course in the art of opening and closing
letters and packages so that they do not appeared tampered with. In 2300, a skill presumed included in
Forgery.
Graymail- Credible
threat by a defendant in a trial to expose classified information if
prosecuted.