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Comment by neurotech1 | Hacker News Reader

The problem today is that with LinkedIn and Facebook, some CIA personnel are stupid enough to actually mention their status with the Agency, or are friends/connections with known CIA Analysts etc. who do mention their status.

NSA Contractors sometimes mention classified codenames in their LinkedIn page. https://www.techdirt.com/articles/20130617/13482623512/disco...

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That seems like something that competent counterintelligence people should be monitoring and shutting down.

Hell, they probably should have unit in their new employee orientation covering this: "Do not list your occupation as 'Spy'" on LinkedIn.

I kinda wanna put spy on my linkedin page now

Honestly, the CIA should want you to too. The more randos listing fake intelligence activities that can't be easily discounted, the more time russian counterintelligence has to spend chasing down false leads.

> time russian counterintelligence has to spend chasing down false leads.

But don't do it if you ever plan on actually traveling to Russia or China. IIRC, they've held innocent Westerners in the past on suspicions of espionage.

I once read an NSA employee manual which talked about how you should talk about your work. It said you should be truthful without making it sound exciting or mysterious.

If asked "where do you work" you say "the department of defense". If asked what branch you say "the NSA". If asked what you do, you say "research". And that's it, apparently.

No doubt there are other manuals for other types of employee, but they're not available on the Internet.

We used to just mess with crappy computers all day while doing the equivalent of memorizing phonebooks. suuuuper boring stuff.

The first part matters a lot less now that the enemy has a copy of all the data the office of personel had collected (everything on everybody with a security clearence who were not CIA). If somebody has access to classified material as part of his/her work and is not on that list that person is CIA.

Some people work for the CIA as analysts or even basic jobs like accounting. It's not all one big super secret thing. If it were you wouldn't have the top spots like the head of recruitment or the director known. There's one professor at my alma mater who is openly known as a in-resident CIA officer and helps people with their tradecraft, it's all on his university site profile page.

I interviewed with the CIA out of college. The first thing they do during interviews is disabuse the applicant of any notion he's applying to be James Bond. The clandestine people are only a tiny, tiny portion of the organization.

Mostly what people do in Langley is move paper from one side of the (electronic) desk to the other, and I don't think foreign powers have any trouble photographing and identifying them as they arrive at the office.

Very few people who work for the spy agencies are "under cover." The ones who are under cover use fake names for their service.

Living in DC you'll run into lot of people who work as analysts for CIA/NSA/FBI/State etc. Some of them have business cards with CIA on it.

The CIA has a starbucks inside.

Are they actually NSA contractors, or is this a honeytrap?

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