5 ms·

Has there ever been a case where two undercover agents are trying to play the other one? Not knowing each other are agents. Or a situation where the guy who an

by wil421 4y ago

Has there ever been a case where two undercover agents are trying to play the other one? Not knowing each other are agents. Or a situation where the guy who an undercover agent approaches tells his superiors? Who then want him to go undercover to find out who the suspected foreign agent works for. I’m sure this can happen in government.

sgjohnson 4y ago
> Has there ever been a case where two undercover agents are trying to play the other one? Not knowing each other are agents. It has happened several times with cops. Feds are a bit more professional I believe.
- wil421 4y ago
  Yea I was specifically thinking the feds due to them being a large bureaucracy. No doubt the local cops have done it.
- mhh__ 4y ago
  Probably no upper bound on IQ for FBI agents
dkokelley 4y ago
I want to see a movie where a major criminal organization is completely overrun by undercover agents of various governments/agencies, but none of them know it so they keep the organization running for fear of being found out. The true criminals have long since retired.
- iudqnolq 4y ago
  You might want Liberty Crossing. It's a mockumentary in the style of The Office, but set in the DHS. One season of TV. There's a subplot vaguely along the lines of everyone being an undercover, although saying more would be a bit too much of a spoiler.
- gumby 4y ago
  It's a bit of a spoiler but you may like the film "The Accountant" starring Ben Affleck. Also the Book "A Scanner Darkly" by Philip K Dick which (no spoiler) explores the consequences of deep undercover.
  - echelon_musk 4y ago
    While we're here, why not also the excellent Deep Cover [0] with Larry Fishburne and Jeff Goldblum. [0] https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0104073/ https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0104073/
    - echelon 4y ago
      Two of my favorite actors - how did I miss this? I'm adding this to my queue. Also, your username totally caught me off guard and made me laugh.
- jerrysievert 4y ago
  not a movie but there's a classic get smart episode where all of the kaos agents captured turn out to be government agents.
- AnimalMuppet 4y ago
  See "The Man Who Was Thursday" by G. K. Chesterton.
- d0mine 4y ago
  There is a real example when a government spy actually led a terrorist organization: "Azef, a double-agent in the employ of the Tsarist secret police Okhrana, changed the Terrorist Brigade's mode of attack from firearms to dynamite" https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SR_Combat_Organization https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SR_Combat_Organization
yieldcrv 4y ago
This happened on the Silk Road case. Part of the reason they never tried Ross Ulbricht for the hit jobs is because a rogue FBI office in Baltimore was staging the hits in a studio (the evidence to show Ross, to get the rest of the payment), and the FBI office in Chicago also investigating Silk Road was like "why are you guys roleplaying, this can't be as cringy as it looks, what is going on in Maryland", and the Secret Service and DEA agents were roleplaying as moderators on Silk Road and creating fake controversy to both Ross Ulbricht and the FBI offices investigating, just so the Secret Service and DEA could extort Ross (for the fake hits) and ride off into the sunset with the money, landing a movie deal with Fox. They're in jail now. And the hitman stuff was dropped under equally fake pretexts just to save face. The Secret Service and DEA agent were being tried at the same time as Ross Ulbricht was, this information and evidence was kept from Ross and his trial and only came to light afterwards. Wasn't accepted in the appeal. Sentencing didn't factor any of this in either. Embarrassing case. https://www.vice.com/en/article/8q845p/dea-agent-who-faked-a-murder-and-took-bitcoins-from-silk-road-explains-himself https://www.vice.com/en/article/8q845p/dea-agent-who-faked-a...
kevin_thibedeau 4y ago
There was an Air Force counterintelligence agent who was caught spying for Iran. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monica_Witt https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monica_Witt
frogblast 4y ago
I recall a news story from a few years ago (can't find it now)... There was once a bank that looked the other way when lots of shady cash came in, allowed transfers of those amounts to to foreign banks, basically ignored KYC rules, etc. Word got around, and lots of criminals all over started using this bank for all of their money laundering purposes. Some banking authority started noticing a lot of suspicious transactions, and was preparing to shut the whole thing down, disconnect the bank from all transfers, raid offices, arrest employees, trumpet press releases about how they're protecting the American financial system, etc... (ie, exactly what they are supposed to do). The bank was, of course, a honeypot run by some other 3-letter agency, who was actively facilitating money laundering in order to collect enormous amounts of info about who was involved. (basically the banking version of that 'encrypted phone' scheme). The raids were mere hours away when someone put two and two together, and managed to get it called off.
tomohawk 4y ago
There's this going on right now: https://rmx.news/germany/german-domestic-intelligence-agents-are-running-hundreds-of-fake-right-wing-extremist-social-media-accounts/ https://rmx.news/germany/german-domestic-intelligence-agents...
c3534l 4y ago
I googled it and it actually seems fairly common. Example: https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/undercover-cops-arrest/ https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/undercover-cops-arrest/
ilamont 4y ago
Happens with attempted infiltration of activists groups. I recall one case where undercover agents from two separate agencies started showing up at meetings of some local environmental or anti-nuclear group and they started writing profiles about each other noting how the other person didn’t really seem to fit.

by wil421 4y ago

sgjohnson 4y ago

> Has there ever been a case where two undercover agents are trying to play the other one? Not knowing each other are agents. It has happened several times with cops. Feds are a bit more professional I believe.

wil421 4y ago
Yea I was specifically thinking the feds due to them being a large bureaucracy. No doubt the local cops have done it.
mhh__ 4y ago
Probably no upper bound on IQ for FBI agents

dkokelley 4y ago

I want to see a movie where a major criminal organization is completely overrun by undercover agents of various governments/agencies, but none of them know it so they keep the organization running for fear of being found out. The true criminals have long since retired.

iudqnolq 4y ago
You might want Liberty Crossing. It's a mockumentary in the style of The Office, but set in the DHS. One season of TV. There's a subplot vaguely along the lines of everyone being an undercover, although saying more would be a bit too much of a spoiler.
gumby 4y ago
It's a bit of a spoiler but you may like the film "The Accountant" starring Ben Affleck. Also the Book "A Scanner Darkly" by Philip K Dick which (no spoiler) explores the consequences of deep undercover.
- echelon_musk 4y ago
  While we're here, why not also the excellent Deep Cover [0] with Larry Fishburne and Jeff Goldblum. [0] https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0104073/ https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0104073/
  - echelon 4y ago
    Two of my favorite actors - how did I miss this? I'm adding this to my queue. Also, your username totally caught me off guard and made me laugh.
jerrysievert 4y ago
not a movie but there's a classic get smart episode where all of the kaos agents captured turn out to be government agents.
AnimalMuppet 4y ago
See "The Man Who Was Thursday" by G. K. Chesterton.
d0mine 4y ago
There is a real example when a government spy actually led a terrorist organization: "Azef, a double-agent in the employ of the Tsarist secret police Okhrana, changed the Terrorist Brigade's mode of attack from firearms to dynamite" https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SR_Combat_Organization https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SR_Combat_Organization

yieldcrv 4y ago

This happened on the Silk Road case. Part of the reason they never tried Ross Ulbricht for the hit jobs is because a rogue FBI office in Baltimore was staging the hits in a studio (the evidence to show Ross, to get the rest of the payment), and the FBI office in Chicago also investigating Silk Road was like "why are you guys roleplaying, this can't be as cringy as it looks, what is going on in Maryland", and the Secret Service and DEA agents were roleplaying as moderators on Silk Road and creating fake controversy to both Ross Ulbricht and the FBI offices investigating, just so the Secret Service and DEA could extort Ross (for the fake hits) and ride off into the sunset with the money, landing a movie deal with Fox. They're in jail now. And the hitman stuff was dropped under equally fake pretexts just to save face. The Secret Service and DEA agent were being tried at the same time as Ross Ulbricht was, this information and evidence was kept from Ross and his trial and only came to light afterwards. Wasn't accepted in the appeal. Sentencing didn't factor any of this in either. Embarrassing case. https://www.vice.com/en/article/8q845p/dea-agent-who-faked-a-murder-and-took-bitcoins-from-silk-road-explains-himself https://www.vice.com/en/article/8q845p/dea-agent-who-faked-a...

kevin_thibedeau 4y ago

There was an Air Force counterintelligence agent who was caught spying for Iran. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monica_Witt https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monica_Witt

frogblast 4y ago

I recall a news story from a few years ago (can't find it now)... There was once a bank that looked the other way when lots of shady cash came in, allowed transfers of those amounts to to foreign banks, basically ignored KYC rules, etc. Word got around, and lots of criminals all over started using this bank for all of their money laundering purposes. Some banking authority started noticing a lot of suspicious transactions, and was preparing to shut the whole thing down, disconnect the bank from all transfers, raid offices, arrest employees, trumpet press releases about how they're protecting the American financial system, etc... (ie, exactly what they are supposed to do). The bank was, of course, a honeypot run by some other 3-letter agency, who was actively facilitating money laundering in order to collect enormous amounts of info about who was involved. (basically the banking version of that 'encrypted phone' scheme). The raids were mere hours away when someone put two and two together, and managed to get it called off.

tomohawk 4y ago

There's this going on right now: https://rmx.news/germany/german-domestic-intelligence-agents-are-running-hundreds-of-fake-right-wing-extremist-social-media-accounts/ https://rmx.news/germany/german-domestic-intelligence-agents...

c3534l 4y ago

I googled it and it actually seems fairly common. Example: https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/undercover-cops-arrest/ https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/undercover-cops-arrest/

ilamont 4y ago

Happens with attempted infiltration of activists groups. I recall one case where undercover agents from two separate agencies started showing up at meetings of some local environmental or anti-nuclear group and they started writing profiles about each other noting how the other person didn’t really seem to fit.