Spies have a lingo all their own. Here are some universal terms, courtesy of the International Spy Museum. Are you head of security for a global corporation? Do you deal with international intelligence? Covert operations? If so, you need this list of spy lingo. It will give you a flavor for the universal truth about spies and spying: They have a colorful lingo. Here are some of the global terms to use when talking shop with security brethren in the United Kingdom, Russia, Germany and elsewhere, courtesy of the International Spy Museum in Washington, D.C. agent: a person officially employed by an intelligence serviceagent-in-place: a government employee who is influenced to cooperate with a foreign government instead of defecting; now working for two employers instead of oneagent-of-influence: a person who works to influence national policy within a target country’s government or media babysitter: bodyguardbang and burn: demolition and sabotage operations birdwatcher: slang used by British Intelligence for a spyblack operations: covert operations that are not attributable to the organization performing themblowback: a deception planted abroad by an intelligence agency that returns to the originating nation with bad consequencesbombe: Polish electromagnetic device created to decipher three-rotor Enigma combinations; early precursor to the modern computerbrush pass: a brief encounter where something is passed between case officer and agentburned: when a case officer or agent is compromised Camp Swampy: CIA’s secret domestic training base (also known as “The Farm”)Camp X: Canada’s secret domestic training basecenter: KGB headquarters in MoscowCheka: Russian secret police founded in 1917 to serve the Bolshevik party; one of the many forerunners of the KGB chief of station: the officer in charge at a CIA station, usually in a foreign capitalcobbler: a spy who creates false passports, visas, diplomas and other documentscolossus: an electronic device that helped solve German cryptogramscovert action operation: an influence operation designed to affect foreign affairsdangle: a person who approaches an intelligence agency with the intent of being recruited to spy against his or her own countrydezinformatsiya (disinformation): KGB term for its well-financed and multifarious program to manipulate the West with liesEnigma: the machine used by the Germans to encode messages during World War IIfriends: general slang for members of an intelligence service; specifically British slang for members of the Secret Intelligence Servicehospital: Russian slang for prisonillness: Russian slang for someone under arrestinnocent postcard: a postcard with an innocuous message sent to an address in a neutral country to verify the continued security of an undercover operativeKGB: Soviet Union’s all-powerful intelligence and security service during the Cold WarMI-5: the British domestic counterintelligence serviceMI-6: the British foreign intelligence servicenaked: a spy operating without cover or backupnugget: British term for the bait (money, political asylum, sex or career opportunity) offered to a potential defectornursemaid: Russian term for the security service officer who accompanies delegations to other countries to prevent anyone from defectingOkhrana: secret police under Russian tsars 1881-1917pig: Russian intelligence term for traitorplaintext: an original message before encryptionPurple: American name for the Japanese diplomatic cipher machine used from 1939-1945Red: American name for an early Japanese diplomatic cipher machinerezident (resident): KGB chief of station in any foreign locationshoe: a false passport or visaSIS: Secret Intelligence Service; another name for Britain’s MI-6sleeper: agent living as an ordinary citizen in a foreign country; acts only when a hostile situation developsSMERSH: short for “Smert Shpionam” (Death to Spies!); the assassination division of the KGBSOE: Special Operations Executive; Britain’s World War II sabotage and subversion organizationStasi: East Germany’s Cold War domestic and foreign intelligence serviceSVR: Sluzhba Vneshney Razvedki, the Russian Foreign Intelligence Service, formed on Dec. 18, 1991walk-in: a defector who declares his or her intentions by walking into an official installation and asking for political asylum or volunteering to work in-place Related content news Amazon’s AWS Control Tower aims to help secure your data’s borders As digital compliance tasks and data sovereignty rules get ever more complicated, Amazon wants automation to help. 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