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For anyone who has seen played "spot the Fed" at DEFCON, blending in is clearly a challenge. (E.g. Most of the hackers there don't have neck muscles that indica
by dweekly 11y ago
For anyone who has seen played "spot the Fed" at DEFCON, blending in is clearly a challenge. (E.g. Most of the hackers there don't have neck muscles that indicate their owners can bench 300+ pounds)
- arethuza 11y agoA friend in the Army was in some kind of team competition that also included a SAS team and he said he could tell who they were just by looking - "nails" as they say. I did make me think that if these guys are so easy to spot then it must make undercover work quite tricky!
- chippy 11y agoIt's a bit of a myth really that of the muscular military spy (even James Bond would fit that role) - most intelligence officers tend to be small and wiry, lacking bulky muscles, trained for speed and agility. They would be fit, but not noticeably so. So they of course be lacking beer bellies and man boobs, but they wouldn't have big muscles. Now someone at DEFCON is not going to be a field agent - they will work in an office behind a computer which leads me to the next myth from DEFCON: that spooks are not geeks. They are exactly that. They are us, like us, have the same interests. They just work against us whilst believing they are working for us.
- arethuza 11y agoNot that I really know - but my stereotype for UK SF personnel is someone that looks more like an Olympic long distance runner than a weightlifter.
- chippy 11y agoahh, yes I'm british so that may be where I've got my information from also!
- OJFord 11y agoUKSF are not equivalent to what the American (if I may be so presumptuous) above termed a "Fed" though. I still largely agree, it's just hard to draw comparisons, although I imagine CID (resp. FBI) personnel even without sidearms may be more naturally inclined to spend time at the gym than the average HN reader.