'Sex-espionage' as a method of intelligence and security agencies

Abstract

Although the organization, operations and methods of security and intelligence services have been standardized by laws and are subject to both internal and external (parliamentary, administrative and judicial) control, these agencies frequently use methods conflicting the principles of legality and ethics. In fact, influenced by 'panic' demands to protect national values and interests 'at all costs', especially in an era of expanding global terrorism and transnational organized crime, security and intelligence agencies are increasingly guided by the maxime that 'the end justifies the means'. Thus, on the one hand, the intelligence and security agencies conduct certain nonintelligence activities among which subversive (specific secret) operations and actions have a special role and importance. On the other hand, within the scope of their legal intelligence and security activities, the agencies frequently use illegal and unethical methods, some of which are based on emotional abuse of the persons subject to these activities. In this regard, the paper focuses on the abuse occurring when an operative or an agent of a security or intelligence service engages in an emotional or sexual relationship with a person who is a source of significant intelligence information, establishing a pseudo emotional (fake love) relationship or blackmailing a person by compromising pornographic materials.