Does anyone know how ISD agents work?

scroobal said:

FBI is both the Federal Police and Domestic Intelligence Agency. That means a combination of Police and ISD. CIA is has external Intelligence remit and cannot operate locally. NSA handles SIGNIT which is the interception of all signals/comms. For Singapore this is done by DSTA.

Click to expand...

correct. it's very territorial here in the u.s. and fbi has federal jurisdiction for certain crimes that cross state boundaries, such as kidnapping, terrorism, wire fraud, inter state serial killing, bank robbery, organized crime, etc. the sg cid is more like a city police department's investigative or detective unit. some states have state level bureau of investigation units responsible for inter city and inter county criminal investigation and enforcement within the state boundary.

scroobal said:

Couple of other interesting approaches for information gathering;

2) Scholarship holders are asked to "help" the country by telling about what is going on among Singaporeans studying overseas. The best joke was those who went to UK and met up and joined in Tan Wah Piow's session. I won't be surprised that in some years, nearly all were involved in sending reports back.

"national duty", " service to the country" , "good old rivalry" and money are powerful motives.

Click to expand...

Thanks for all your inputs. Allow me to clarify with a concrete example.

Let's say someone was indeed approached by ISD/SID in the above scenario- young scholarship holder overseas being asked to "spy" on fellow scholars. Let's assume s/he did a good job doing this and returned to Singapore- surely the ties with ISD/SID will not abruptly break? But yet, for the purposes of the scholarship, s/he has to be assigned back to a "proper" work organization. In the course of 8 years, this person has floated from one Ministry to another, barely staying each for two years; even granted no pay leave for nine months at one point and then resign from civil servace and now has been "jobless" for months. Jobless yet seemingly unconcerned about money. Does this person sound like an informant/spy/agent?

Someone is getting close to me and I smell something completely fishy. I have two other friends who confided they are also recently befriended (and for one wooed) by friendly people whom they know little about. For me, it is the same, I seem to know alot about this person that I got to know recently, but yet I do not know the most basic things about him/her. What gives?

I am not trying to be paranoid but I sense something slowly but surely going amiss.

steffychun said:

DSTA doesnt do SIGNT. Singapore's NSA is handled by the military/MINDEF.

Click to expand...

There is so much you don't know about and there is so much I would not reveal here or to anyone I know. If you want unbiased firsthand information, Army Recruitment Centres offer the position of Intelligence Officers vocation and they get posed around in MIO

The only catch is you will have to wear the epulattes of a Military Expert and have others unsure what to call you

SneeringTree said:

I am not trying to be paranoid but I sense something slowly but surely going amiss.

Click to expand...

You will have to be very careful. ISD agents can just be your drinking buddy for years.

Goh Meng Seng

So SID is CIA equivalent (more or less).......then where do they train? Got a Langley equivalent? So are most of them trained killers recruited from the special forces?

Narong Wongwan said:

So SID is CIA equivalent (more or less).......then where do they train? Got a Langley equivalent? So are most of them trained killers recruited from the special forces?

Click to expand...

Mostly scholars as bro Scroobal puts out, not very wham-bam-thank-you-mame types.

wikiphile said:

Mostly scholars as bro Scroobal puts out, the level of their work and analysis are sometimes atrocious to say the least but some consumers assuming these guys are grads have some standard in their work and assume just as blindly.

Click to expand...

how to become spies like that? CIA have the non combat type of analysts but most important are the field agents that are supposed to be spy trained right?

Narong Wongwan said:

how to become spies like that? CIA have the non combat type of analysts but most important are the field agents that are supposed to be spy trained right?

Click to expand...

We're not like Mossad bro or the CIA where they have tons of para-military activities, our super spies are probably top scholars who like to anal-lise stuff and not get their hands dirty.

The entire cloak-and-dagger thing is too glamourised

Papsmearer said:

ISD is not a spy org per se. The CIA is. ISD is more along the lines of the FBI.

Click to expand...

ISD is a secret police like Gestapo.

SneeringTree said:

E.g. How and when are they recruited? Do they keep a "normal" job to hide their real ISD job, etc?

Click to expand...

They work in SPH, editors and columnists in the Straits Times and Mediacorp.

You all have been watching too many Mission Impossible and James Bond movies. CIA was nothing like as depicted. I've visited their HQ at Langley, Virginia. Just a bunch of civil service bureaucrats gathering intelligence to be passed to State Department and Pentagon. But yes, their operation is worldwide. And yes, you can call them spies especially for those who work abroad. But the typical CIA spy would look and behave more like Krafty or Alamaking than James Bond or Ethan Hunt. One average US city police department shoots more people than CIA worldwide.

wikiphile said:

We're not like Mossad bro or the CIA where they have tons of para-military activities, our super spies are probably top scholars who like to anal-lise stuff and not get their hands dirty.

The entire cloak-and-dagger thing is too glamourised

Click to expand...

analyze stuff from where? need to inflitrate right? if not how to gather intelligence? someone got to wire tape or bug the phone etc right? need trained personnel for these....

Narong Wongwan said:

analyze stuff from where? need to inflitrate right? if not how to gather intelligence? someone got to wire tape or bug the phone etc right? need trained personnel for these....

Click to expand...

I'll beat around the bush a bit for this, here's a clue - we don't have as many eyeballs on the ground (Humint) so we mainly use other means now

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intelligence_(information_gathering)

SneeringTree said:

Someone is getting close to me and I smell something completely fishy. I have two other friends who confided they are also recently befriended (and for one wooed) by friendly people whom they know little about. For me, it is the same, I seem to know alot about this person that I got to know recently, but yet I do not know the most basic things about him/her. What gives?

I am not trying to be paranoid but I sense something slowly but surely going amiss.

Click to expand...

the person could be horny and hitting on you, or..... maybe even a foreign spy even if you think spies want to get to know you because of what you do etc

scroobal said:

Right you are.

Lets not forget that PAP and YPAP are also closely observed, fully penetrated and have their own informants and listening posts.

Click to expand...

Nothing compared to the opposition. Whatever dirt exposed on their own, not likely to be used to embarrass them.

Narong Wongwan said:

So SID is CIA equivalent (more or less).......then where do they train? Got a Langley equivalent? So are most of them trained killers recruited from the special forces?

Click to expand...

Quite a number of them were ex-SAF chaps. They also talent spot businessmen who have businesses overseas. Training done in-house. No trained killers involved.

It sounds 'kilat' alright but is a weak entity. From the outside, looks and sounds good. In reality, nothing to shout about. Their chaps fear their own shadows. How to achieve things of substance when their IOs were chobolans while in active service?

They could not even detect traitors within their own organisation. It is, in a nutshell, a bloody joke. But where budget is concerned, the sky is the limit.

wikiphile said:

We're not like Mossad bro or the CIA where they have tons of para-military activities, our super spies are probably top scholars who like to anal-lise stuff and not get their hands dirty.

The entire cloak-and-dagger thing is too glamourised

Click to expand...

You have succinctly summarised that entity.

Narong Wongwan said:

analyze stuff from where? need to inflitrate right? if not how to gather intelligence? someone got to wire tape or bug the phone etc right? need trained personnel for these....

Click to expand...

Comes through overt and covert sources. Overt sources - magazines, govt reports etc. Covert - technical and humint sources.

In the case of the latter, not so easy coz you are based in a foreign land and don't have the control over many set-ups and assets. In your home country, you do the needful on foreign missions/personnel. But, having trianed personnel on the opposite end, you are unlikely to get anything of significance from technical sources.

SneeringTree said:

Thanks for all your inputs. Allow me to clarify with a concrete example. ....
I am not trying to be paranoid but I sense something slowly but surely going amiss.

Click to expand...

It takes two to tango and if you get invited to dance, you can lead the dance and do 2 left feet, right? You are a free man right? If you are a homo, you can express true feelings to him. And if you are into beastiality, you can tell her about that 1.3 metre german shepherd and its princely sceptre. Look, people are courting you daily, either on an individual or organizational basis. So why so worked up? The PRC govt could already have been up on you and you did not even notice.

SID definitely doesnt have a Langley.

But some of its secrets are exposed in Tim Huxley's book.

and

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ng_Chee_Khern

MINDEF helps with SIGINT no question about that.