The Security Information Service (BIS) ( cs, Bezpečnostní informační služba), is the primary domestic national

intelligence agency An intelligence agency is a government agency responsible for the collection, Intelligence analysis, analysis, and exploitation of information in support of law enforcement, national security, military, public safety, and foreign policy objective ...

of the

Czech Republic The Czech Republic, or simply Czechia, is a landlocked country in Central Europe. Historically known as Bohemia, it is bordered by Austria to the south, Germany to the west, Poland to the northeast, and Slovakia to the southeast. The ...

. It is responsible for collecting, analyzing, reporting and disseminating intelligence on threats to Czech Republic's

national security National security, or national defence, is the security and defence of a sovereign state, including its citizens, economy, and institutions, which is regarded as a duty of government. Originally conceived as protection against military atta ...

, and conducting operations,

covert Secrecy is the practice of hiding information from certain individuals or groups who do not have the "need to know", perhaps while sharing it with other individuals. That which is kept hidden is known as the secret. Secrecy is often controvers ...

and overt, both domestically and abroad. It also reports to and advises the

Government of the Czech Republic The Government of the Czech Republic ( cz, Vláda České republiky) exercises executive power in the Czech Republic. The members of the government are the Prime Minister of the Czech Republic (Chairman of the Government), the deputy prime min ...

on national security issues and situations that threaten the security of the nation. The BIS headquarters is located in Stodůlky,

Prague 5 Prague 5, formally the Prague Municipal District (''Městská čast Praha 5''), is a second-tier municipality in Prague. The administrative district (''správní obvod'') of the same name consists of municipal districts Prague 5 and Slivenec. Pr ...

. The Security Information Service reports directly to the Government,

Prime Minister A prime minister, premier or chief of cabinet is the head of the cabinet and the leader of the ministers in the executive branch of government, often in a parliamentary or semi-presidential system. Under those systems, a prime minister is not ...

and

President of the Czech Republic The president of the Czech Republic is the head of state of the Czech Republic and the commander-in-chief of the Armed Forces of the Czech Republic. The president mostly has ceremonial powers as the day-to-day business of the executive governm ...

and is overseen by the Permanent Commission of the

Chamber of Deputies The chamber of deputies is the lower house in many bicameral legislatures and the sole house in some unicameral legislatures. Description Historically, French Chamber of Deputies was the lower house of the French Parliament during the Bourbon R ...

Command, control and organization

The BIS is a statutory body under the ''Act No. 154/1994 Coll., on the Security Information Service'' and it is strictly

apolitical Apoliticism is apathy or antipathy towards all political affiliations. A person may be described as apolitical if they are uninterested or uninvolved in politics. Being apolitical can also refer to situations in which people take an unbiased pos ...

and has no police powers; BIS cannot detain, arrest or interrogate suspects. The service reports to the

Government A government is the system or group of people governing an organized community, generally a state. In the case of its broad associative definition, government normally consists of legislature, executive, and judiciary. Government is a ...

and

and its activities are regulated and controlled by the Government, Permanent Commission of the

and its own internal audit. The service is headed by the Director who is appointed by the

with consent of the Committee on Security of the Chamber of Deputies. The current director is , serving since 15 August 2016, after being sworn in by the Prime Minister

Bohuslav Sobotka Bohuslav Sobotka (; born 23 October 1971) is a Czech politician and lawyer who served as the Prime Minister of the Czech Republic from January 2014 to December 2017 and Leader of the Czech Social Democratic Party (ČSSD) from 2010 until his resig ...

Duties

The Security Information Service performs duties associated with the analysis, democracy and constitutionality,

terrorism Terrorism, in its broadest sense, is the use of criminal violence to provoke a state of terror or fear, mostly with the intention to achieve political or religious aims. The term is used in this regard primarily to refer to intentional violen ...

counter-intelligence Counterintelligence is an activity aimed at protecting an agency's intelligence program from an opposition's intelligence service. It includes gathering information and conducting activities to prevent espionage, sabotage, assassinations or ot ...

cybersecurity Computer security, cybersecurity (cyber security), or information technology security (IT security) is the protection of computer systems and networks from attack by malicious actors that may result in unauthorized information disclosure, the ...

organized crime Organized crime (or organised crime) is a category of transnational, national, or local groupings of highly centralized enterprises run by criminals to engage in illegal activity, most commonly for profit. While organized crime is generally th ...

, proliferation and use of strategically important intelligence regarding the fields of

politics Politics (from , ) is the set of activities that are associated with making decisions in groups, or other forms of power relations among individuals, such as the distribution of resources or status. The branch of social science that studies ...

economics Economics () is the social science that studies the Production (economics), production, distribution (economics), distribution, and Consumption (economics), consumption of goods and services. Economics focuses on the behaviour and intera ...

and intelligence within the territory of the Czech Republic.

References

External links

* * * *
BIS (Czech Counter-intelligence service) in transformation, 1994-2014
, Yu Cheng, European Intelligence Academy,

Charles University in Prague Charles University ( cs, Univerzita Karlova, UK; la, Universitas Carolina; german: Karls-Universität), also known as Charles University in Prague or historically as the University of Prague ( la, Universitas Pragensis, links=no), is the oldest an ...

, July 2014

Notes

{{authority control Security Information Service, Czech Czech intelligence community 1994 establishments in the Czech Republic

Command, control and organization

Duties

See also

References

External links

Notes