Malaysian Defence Intelligence Organisation is the

military intelligence Military intelligence is a military discipline that uses information collection and analysis approaches to provide guidance and direction to assist commanders in their decisions. This aim is achieved by providing an assessment of data from a ...

agency of Malaysia Armed Forces. Its role is said to be equivalent to the US

Defense Intelligence Agency The Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA) is an intelligence agency and combat support agency of the United States Department of Defense, specializing in defense and military intelligence. A component of the Department of Defense (DoD) and the I ...

. MDIO is headed by an army

lieutenant general Lieutenant general (Lt Gen, LTG and similar) is a three-star military rank (NATO code OF-8) used in many countries. The rank traces its origins to the Middle Ages, where the title of lieutenant general was held by the second-in-command on the ...

and consists of tri services military branch such as army intelligence,

naval intelligence Military intelligence is a military discipline that uses information collection and analysis approaches to provide guidance and direction to assist commanders in their decisions. This aim is achieved by providing an assessment of data from a ...

and air force intelligence. MDIO was officially formed on 1 October 1981 as Defense Intelligence Staff Division (DISD) to replace the Joint Intelligence Directorate (JID) and the main role of the MDIO at that time was to gather and produce intelligence products to deal with the threat of the Communist Party of Malaya (CPM) during the

Second Malayan Emergency The second (symbol: s) is the unit of Time in physics, time in the International System of Units (SI), historically defined as of a day – this factor derived from the division of the day first into 24 hours, then to 60 minutes and finally t ...

. The head of MDIO is known as Director General and reporting directly to Chief of Armed Forces. It also reports to the Minister of Defence and the

National Security Division National Security Division, or Bahagian Keselamatan Negara (BKN), is a senior grouping within the Malaysian government which meets infrequently. According to a United States Embassy telegram leaked by WikiLeaks in 2011, BKN is regarded as Malaysia' ...

. The current director is Lt. Gen. Dato' Paduka Abdul Hadi Haji Hussin. The Defense Intelligence Staff Division (DISD) now known as the Malaysian Defense Intelligence Organization (MDIO) was established with the expansion and restructuring of the organization. The Armed Forces Defence Intelligence Staff Division (DISD) has been renamed as the Malaysian Defence Intelligence Organisation (MDIO). The name and logo change were officially done on 23 September 2022 by Chief of Defence Forces General Affendi Buang.

Notes and references

{{authority control Federal ministries, departments and agencies of Malaysia Ministry of Defence (Malaysia) Military intelligence agencies Malaysian intelligence agencies Military of Malaysia