Explore Business Standard
Intelligence
The US Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard, Canadian spy chief Daniel Rogers and Britain's MI6 boss Richard Moore will be among top global intelligence czars converging in India this weekend to attend a security conclave, people familiar with the matter said on Tuesday. India's National Security Advisor Ajit Doval is set to chair the India-hosted conclave on March 16 which is expected to deliberate on ways to enhance intelligence-sharing to combat terrorism and various transnational crimes. Intelligence chiefs of Australia, Germany, New Zealand and several other friendly countries of India are also expected to join the deliberations to be held in New Delhi. Gabbard is visiting India as part of a multi-nation tour of Japan, Thailand and France. It will be the first high-level visit to India by a top official of the Donald Trump administration. Besides attending the intelligence chiefs' conclave, Gabbard is likely to address the Raisina Dialogue and hold a one-on-one mee
Taiwan's intelligence bureau says China's main spy agency is working with criminal gangs, shell companies and other dubious partners to gain intelligence on Taiwan's defences, resulting in a major rise in those arrested for alleged espionage on the island. Current and retired Taiwanese military personnel are a special concern, accounting for around half of the 64 alleged spies put on trial last year, it said. That number is up from 16 in 2021 and 10 in 2022. The arrests are in line with China's stepped-up campaign of military intimidation, economic coercion and gray area tactics such as utilizing the internet to promote unification and providing all-expense-paid trips to China to low-level government officials. According to a report released over the weekend by Taiwan's National Security Bureau, Chinese agents have sought to use the Taiwanese underworld to channel funds to those with information to sell. Gangs, many with origins dating to before the 1949 split between the two sides,
BJP president J P Nadda on Sunday claimed that according to an intelligence report, the JMM-led coalition government in Jharkhand gave shelter to Bangladeshi infiltrators in madrasas and ensured that they got land and government documents like Aadhaar card. Nadda also hit out at Congress leader Rahul Gandhi saying that he wants to become champion of Other Backward Classes, but questioned how many OBC members were in Rajiv Gandhi Foundation, a social service organisation headed by Sonia Gandhi, and the National Advisory Committee of the erstwhile UPA regime. The BJP president attacked Congress and the JMM, the two main constituents of the ruling coalition of Jharkhand, during his addresses at three election rallies during the day. "I have received an intelligence report just now. It says that Bangladeshi infiltrators are given shelter in madrasas here. Their Aadhaar, voter ID, gas connection and ration card are facilitated and then the Hemant Soren government ensures land for them,
The CIA wants to make it easier -- and safer -- for people in Iran, China and North Korea to share information with the US's premier spy agency. The agency on Wednesday posted online instructions in Korean, Mandarin and Farsi detailing steps that potential informants can take to contact US intelligence officials without putting themselves in danger. The instructions include ways to reach the CIA on its public website or on the darknet, a part of the Internet that can only be accessed using special tools designed to hide the user's identity. The CIA posted similar instructions in Russian two years ago following Russia's invasion of Ukraine. "People are trying to reach out to us from around the world and we are offering them instructions for how to do that safely," the agency said in a statement. "Our efforts on this front have been successful in Russia, and we want to make sure individuals in other authoritarian regimes know that we're open for business." The tips, presented in ...
Artificial intelligence will change the world of espionage, but it won't replace the need for human spies, the head of Britain's MI6 intelligence agency says in prepared remarks released Wednesday. Richard Moore, director of the UK's foreign intelligence agency, is set to speak in Prague on evolving threats to the West from Russia and Iran, and argue that the human factor will remain crucial in an era of rapidly evolving machine learning. AI is going to make information infinitely more accessible and some have asked whether it will put intelligence services like mine out of business, he says in extracts released in advance by the UK government. In fact, the opposite is likely to be true," he adds. "As AI trawls the ocean of open source, there will be even greater value in landing, with a well-cast fly, the secrets that lie beyond the reach of its nets. Moore, who has previously warned that the West was falling behind rivals in the AI race, will argue that the unique characteristics
The FBI and the Department of Homeland Security downplayed or ignored a massive amount of intelligence information ahead of the January 6, 2021, attack on the US Capitol, according to the chairman of a Senate panel that on Tuesday released a new report on the intelligence failures ahead of the insurrection. The report details how the agencies failed to recognize and warn of the potential for violence as some of then-President Donald Trump's supporters openly planned the siege in messages and forums online. Among the multitude of intelligence that was overlooked was a December 2020 tip to the FBI that members of the far-right extremist group Proud Boys planned to be in Washington, DC, for the certification of Joe Biden's victory and their "plan is to literally kill people", the report said. The Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee said the agencies were also aware of many social media posts that foreshadowed violence, some calling on Trump's supporters to come
The GST intelligence officers have busted a syndicate operating 569 fake firms and passing on fraudulent tax credit of Rs 1,047 crore, the finance ministry said on Monday. The Jaipur Zonal Unit of Directorate General of GST Intelligence (DGGI) has busted a major crime syndicate operating in 14 states, based out of Delhi. The ministry said Delhi-based Rishabh Jain, aged 30, had hired 10 employees for operating these fake firms. After extensive recce and data analytics, the officials of DGGI, Jaipur were able to trace this mastermind in Delhi and nabbed him. This syndicate has issued invoices having taxable turnover of Rs 6,022 crore involving input tax credit (ITC) of Rs 1,047 crore through these 569 fake firms to more than 2,000 beneficiary firms. The majority of the fake firms are located in Delhi with presence in 13 other states -- Rajasthan, Uttar Pradesh, Punjab, Bihar, Jharkhand, Gujarat, Maharashtra, Haryana, West Bengal, Karnataka, Goa, Assam and Uttarakhand. So far, 73 ban