brass plate firm
   HOME

TheInfoList



OR:

In espionage, operatives under non-official cover (NOC) are operatives without official ties to the government for which they work who assume
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 ...
roles in organizations. This is in contrast to an operative with official cover, where they assume a position in their government, such as the diplomatic service, which provides them with diplomatic immunity if their espionage activities are discovered. Operatives under non-official cover do not have this "safety net", and if captured and charged as spies are subject to severe criminal punishments, up to and including execution. Operatives under non-official cover are also usually trained to deny any connection with their government, thus preserving
plausible deniability Plausible deniability is the ability of people, typically senior officials in a formal or informal chain of command, to denial, deny knowledge of or responsibility for any damnable actions committed by members of their organizational hierarchy. Th ...
, but also denying them any hope of diplomatic legal assistance – or official acknowledgment of their service. Such an operative or agent may be referred to as a ''NOC'' (pronounced ) or as an ''illegal'' (see Clandestine HUMINT operational techniques). Sometimes, front companies or strawman entities are established in order to provide false identities for agents.


History

An agent sent to spy on a foreign country might, for instance, work as a businessperson, a worker for a non-profit organization (such as a humanitarian group), or an academic. For example, the
CIA The Central Intelligence Agency (CIA ), known informally as the Agency and historically as the Company, is a civilian intelligence agency, foreign intelligence service of the federal government of the United States, officially tasked with gat ...
's
Ishmael Jones Ishmael Jones (born 15 December 1960) is the pseudonym used by a former CIA officer. He resigned from the CIA and became a leading proponent of American intelligence reform, with special emphasis on the improvement of human source intelligence co ...
spent nearly two decades as a NOC. Many of the agents memorialized without names or dates of service on the CIA Memorial Wall are assumed to have been killed or executed in a foreign country while serving as NOC agents. In nations with established and well-developed spy agencies, the majority of captured non-native NOC agents have, however, historically been repatriated through prisoner exchanges for other captured NOCs as a form of
gentlemen's agreement A gentlemen's agreement, or gentleman's agreement, is an informal and legally non-binding agreement between two or more parties. It is typically oral, but it may be written or simply understood as part of an unspoken agreement by convention or th ...
. Some countries have regulations regarding the use of non-official cover: the CIA, for example, has at times been prohibited from disguising agents as members of certain aid organizations, or as members of the clergy. The degree of sophistication put into non-official cover stories varies considerably. Sometimes, an agent will simply be appointed to a position in a well-established company which can provide the appropriate opportunities. Other times, entire front companies can be established in order to provide false identities for agents. Examples include Air America, used by the CIA during the Vietnam War, and Brewster Jennings & Associates, used by the CIA in WMD investigations and made public as a result of the Plame affair.


Examples

Former MI6 officer "Nicholas Anderson" wrote an account of his service in a fictionalized autobiography (as per British law) entitled ''NOC: Non-Official Cover: British Secret Operations'', and two sequels: ''NOC Twice: More UK Non-Official Cover Operations'' and ''NOC Three Times: Knock-On Effect (Last of the Trilogy)''. Michael Ross, a former
Mossad Mossad ( , ), ; ar, الموساد, al-Mōsād, ; , short for ( he, המוסד למודיעין ולתפקידים מיוחדים, links=no), meaning 'Institute for Intelligence and Special Operations'. is the national intelligence agency ...
officer, operated as a Mossad NOC or "combatant" as described in his memoir, ''The Volunteer: The Incredible True Story of an Israeli Spy on the Trail of International Terrorists'' (Skyhorse Publishing, September 2007, ). Fictional notable examples include
Chuck Barris Charles Hirsch Barris (June 3, 1929 – March 21, 2017) was an American game show creator, producer, and host. Barris was known for hosting ''The Gong Show'' and creating ''The Dating Game'' and ''The Newlywed Game''. He was also a songwrite ...
, who made a satirical claim to have been a NOC with 33 kills in his book and movie '' Confessions of a Dangerous Mind''. Other examples are featured in the books '' Debt of Honor'' and '' The Eleventh Commandment''; the films '' Mission: Impossible'', '' Spy Game'', '' The Bourne Identity'', '' Safe House'', and ''
The Recruit __NOTOC__ Recruit can refer to: Military * Military recruitment * Recruit training, in the military * ''Rekrut'' (English: Recruit), a military recruit or low rank in German-speaking countries * Seaman recruit Books *''Le Réquisitionnaire'' (En ...
''; and the television shows '' The Americans'', ''
Burn Notice ''Burn Notice'' is an American espionage television series created by Matt Nix, which originally aired on the USA Network for a total of seven seasons from June 28, 2007, to September 12, 2013. The show stars Jeffrey Donovan, Gabrielle Anwar, ...
'', '' Spooks'', ''
The Night Manager ''The Night Manager'' is an espionage novel by British writer John le Carré, published in 1993. It is his first post- Cold War novel, detailing an undercover operation to bring down a major international arms dealer. Plot summary Jonathan Pin ...
'', '' Covert Affairs'', '' The Spy'', and '' Patriot''.


See also

* Illegals Program * Secret identity *
Sleeper agent A sleeper agent, also called sleeper cell, is a spy who is placed in a target country or organization not to undertake an immediate mission but to act as a potential asset if activated. Even if unactivated, the "sleeper agent" is still an asset ...


References

{{intelligence cycle management Covert organizations Spies by role