Fake Names & Secret Identities: How Intelligence Agents Operate | David Bickford | FO569 Raj Shamani
Figuring Out with Raj Shamani
Former MI5 and MI6 legal director David Bickford shares an inside look at the complexities of intelligence operations, recruitment, and over
Key takeaways
- Integrity is the most critical trait for intelligence agents because they must maintain absolute truthfulness to their agency while living deceptive lives in the field.
- Effective recruitment focuses on determination, patience, and the ability to balance individual rights against state necessity.
Main topics
- Intelligence recruitment criteria
- MI5 and MI6 oversight mechanisms
Notable quotes
At the top of the list of any intelligence agent is integrity because their whole essence is to go out and pretend to be someone they're not.
Conclusion
A masterclass in perspective, blending high-level espionage history wi
Transcript preview
Speaker 1 (0:00) The amount of cocaine that's consumed in London is outrageous. They think it's a fun thing to do, like alcohol. They don't realize what they're doing. That's the problem. What? Well, if you go back to the origins of cocaine, where does it come from? It comes from Colombia, South America, where it's grown. And you've got farmers who are being oppressed by the drugs lords. You've got inter-gang warfare where people are being killed. Then the drugs get transferred over to the UK. They're in a direct chain from murder, mayhem, torture, rape, all the rest of it. They're part of it. Speaker 2 (0:40) You've also said somewhere that organized crime is more dangerous than terrorism. Speaker 1 (0:45) Why? You can see terrorism. You can see the bombings and killings. You can see the organizations. It's open. Organized crime isn't. It's insidious. It goes into money laundering, goes into cafes and pubs and prostitution, fraud. The problem is the amount of money that can be made is huge. Speaker 2 (1:11) What do you think is the biggest problem for all the agencies in the world today? Speaker 1 (1:15) Fraud is extremely difficult. Trying to trace back where it comes because it comes out of the dark web. Arms trafficking. Speaker 2 (1:21) You were the legal director for MI5. Speaker 1 (1:25) And 6. Speaker 2 (1:27) When the top intelligence agencies, when they are recruiting somebody, what are they looking for? Speaker 1 (1:32) At the top of the list of any intelligence agent is integrity because their whole essence is to go out and pretend to be someone they're not. Speaker 1 (1:42) And to tell lies, to draw people in. Very careful lies, Mark, because if you're found out, you're in trouble. What do you look for? They're like, oh, this is golden. I want to hire this. They're determined. They have a lot of patience. Some operations can take years to come to fruition. And balance, to understand people, to understand how far you can go, how far you can't. Those are the really important qualities of an intelligence agent. Speaker 2 (2:11) What are the powers of an intelligence officer? Yeah, good. Speaker 1 (2:13) They can follow people around. They can investigate their background against their right to privacy. Entering somebody's property, for instance. Stealing their documents or that sort of thing. Speaker 2 (2:23) How easy it is to make passports and give multiple countries' passports to one person? Speaker 1 (2:29) You know, if you go down the pub, you can always get a passport. Speaker 2 (2:31) Really? You can get a fake passport on an internet? On some website? Really? Deep Speaker 1 (2:36) net, yeah. Speaker 2 (2:38) Did you ever have any fake passport in your life? Yes, I did. These are different passports. This is British, US, India, Saudi Arabia, Japan, Pakistan, Republic of Korea. Which is the easiest passport to get out of all of them? Speaker 1 (2:53) No, I'll tell you something. That is scary. Speaker 2 (3:05) I have a small favor to ask you. I need you to subscribe to our channel. The more subscribers we have, the better and bigger guests we can bring and provide you more value through these conversations. And the full audio experience of this show is also available on Spotify, where you can follow us and listen to the new episodes as well. My team and I have been traveling to the US more frequently for our global guest. And one thing that's a big challenge for a lot of Indians there is sending money back home. Either the exchange rate is bad, the transfer is slow, or there's worry about whether the money will reach safely or not. That's the exact problem TapTapSend solves. With TapTapSend, you can send money from the US and Canada straight to an Indian bank account or UPI. They offer competitive rates, the process is simple and you can do it from home. And that's why it's trusted by more than 15 million people globally. And with the festive season coming, It's so much easier to send money to your loved one so they can celebrate without any wait or worry. TapTapSend is also giving our viewers a special bonus. Just use code FIGURINGOUT to learn more about TapTapSend. Check the link in the description below. Speaker 2 (4:28) everyone if someone's watching you for the first time right who are you and what have you done in past and why should somebody watch this because my loose framing of your introduction would be that you held one of the most important jobs in the world. Speaker 1 (4:50) That's a nice way of putting it. Very flattering. Thank you. Speaker 2 (4:53) If there was, and if I have to put it rather more dramatically, is if James Bond was real, he would need your signature to go get an approval for any mission that he wants to do. True. Right? That's essentially what you did. You were the legal director for MI5. Speaker 1 (5:15) Yes, on six. And Speaker 2 (5:16) six both. Yeah. Incredible. Tell us about you and tell me, where were you born? How did you land up in this situation? Good point. Speaker 1 (5:27) Well, I was born in Dorset, in sort of about 120 miles from London. I was born between two air raids. It was just at the beginning of the war. My mother said the first one brought me on and the second one finished her off. Speaker 1 (5:45) But I think this gave me a sort of anti-authoritarian attitude, quite frankly. I think I resented being born. Speaker 1 (5:56) Then when I was six, the end of the war, my father set up an airline, British South American Airways, with a chum of his in the RAF. And he went out to Brazil to set up the South American end. And I visited them once a year during my summer holidays. And then I stayed with either grandparents or a wonderful godfather who was a doctor. during the other holidays. Speaker 2 (6:25) And that was Speaker 1 (6:27) adventure. If you're on your own, you're independent. You had to be independent at boarding school when you were six. So it was great. The other benefit of all that was there was very little parental control. Because seeing them once a year for the summer holidays was sort of spoiling time rather than discipline time. So I think that sort of developed more the sort of, as you put it, curiosity of what goes on in the world. How can I survive in this world? Not that one looked at it that way, but it was huge fun. And the world was sort of really opened up by that experience. When you were Speaker 2 (7:12) born, you were literally born at the time when there was bombing happening. Yes. Right. So you were born with knowing and having a feeling that I could be bombed, my city, my area, my parents, my family, anything could be bombed right now. So when you're born in a situation where you've literally seen bombing, left, right, center, do you start hating everybody and you're born with a lot of anger? Or do you start fearing everybody? Yeah, Speaker 1 (7:47) very, very interesting question. After I was born, we went up to live next door to a bomber aerodrome. And my grandfather or step-grandfather at that time was a priest. He was a vicar. And quite naturally, there would be crashes at the bomber squadron. We'd go up and he would visit the site to bless the site. And I would go up there to pick up remnants that I wanted to keep. That sort of typical kid attitude. Speaker 1 (8:19) But yes, we cheered. You watched the bombs going into the aircraft and one would cheer saying, yes, good, you know, go and drop bombs on these dreadful people. And one did hate. And one's parents hated quite naturally. I mean, my parents have been through the First World War as well as the Second World War. So there was hatred. Speaker 1 (8:51) It wasn't until I think it's pretty fair to say that I did my travelling and I got to know other people that one suddenly realised, no, you can't hate the people. The people you have to hate are the people who started it and the people who went along with it unnecessarily. They're the people who are your target, not the ordinary Germans who, the time we were there in Berlin for three and a half, four years, marvellous. Absolutely brilliant. Made a lot of friends. And also curious enough with the Russians when we were in Berlin. Made a lot of friends with the Russians. You have to be very careful and suck with a long spoon. But, you know, they've got a great sense of humour. They can be up and down. They can be very depressed as well as very happy. You know about Russians. But they have a sense of fun and a sense of belonging. They have a sense of Russia. A lot of them lurking underneath whatever their sort of governmental situation is, whether it's autocracy under Putin or more or less autocracy under the communist regime. But they have a basic love of their country. Speaker 2 (10:11) So you... But then when you started traveling, you started loving other human beings. Before that, you were hating. You were like, let's just go bomb these people. They're dreadful. Yes. And did that childhood conditioning or probably, let's say, childhood trauma in some sort, did that linger over you in your later career as well? Speaker 1 (10:35) No, we didn't believe in trauma then. Speaker 1 (10:43) My children are shocked at mine and Carrie, my wife's attitude. We were told to scrub a floor. You know, if one got down about anything, go and scrub a floor. Speaker 2 (11:01) I meant the childhood conditioning of that you've been hating people. Yes. Did that somehow come back in your British intelligence role as well, where you were like, okay, other Speaker 1 (11:12) people Speaker 2 (11:13) are bad, I need to make sure that Speaker 1 (11:14) we need to go and do something. No, that's the last thing you want in any intelligence agent. Absolutely. Speaker 1 (11:27) The conditioning there is two things. First of all, there has to be balance. One has to be able to balance the rights of the individual against the rights of the state. Very, very important. And that's where the lawyers come in to help with that balance. If you hate the people that you're investigating or trying to get information from, you're skewed. You don't have a balanced opinion of who they are. And if you're trying to talk to someone and get them on board, if you hate them, you're a complete disadvantage. So no, not at all. And at the top of the list of any intelligence agent is integrity. Speaker 1 (12:21) Which is very curious thought because the whole essence is to go out and pretend to be someone they're not. Just whole life live like a lie. Absolutely. And to tell lies, to draw people in. Very careful lies, Mark, because if you're found out, you're in trouble. So integrity, why? Why integrity if that's what you're... whole essence is, not whole essence, but part of the essence. If you send someone out into the field to report, to do something and to come back and tell you what they've done, if they don't tell you the absolute truth, and they don't tell it to you in a way that's been analysed in a balanced way, you are in trouble. And so are the people you're investigating or you're trying to bring on board, because you get a different idea of them. A, that can lead you into trouble because it can lead you into a trap. B, importantly, if you're investigating someone who's a terrorist and you get the wrong person because of that information, you are damaging someone's life totally unnecessarily. So integrity is absolutely vital. Speaker 2 (13:34) But how do you judge that this person is telling the truth or no? Because Speaker 1 (13:40) that's the most important part. Yeah. Speaker 1 (13:43) The first thing is recruitment. The second thing is training. Speaker 2 (13:47) So what do you, when the top spy intelligence agencies, when they are recruiting somebody, what are they looking for? Speaker 1 (13:55) Yeah, very good point. Well, obviously, as I said, integrity first. I think they're looking for someone who understands the goal to start with. And the goal is protecting the state. Speaker 1 (14:11) And that's protecting not only the government, but more importantly, actually, the people. So you have all these people in your mind that you're out there to protect to the best of your ability, and that's to protect them from national security threats and also economic well-being threats. Speaker 1 (14:32) So that's your goal, which is quite clear, really. Speaker 2 (14:36) Yeah. Speaker 1 (14:37) How do you do it? I think determination, very, very important. Speaker 2 (14:41) But how do you judge all of these things? Because it's so difficult. Anybody can pretend to be determined, patriotic, telling you lies that, hey, I love the state, I want to do this and that. And you can't judge it. You're talking to the best Speaker 1 (14:57) interrogators in the Speaker 2 (14:58) world. And do you find people who are... probably vulnerable so that you can actually blackmail them into doing something very strong because you know that they can't go back and they have nothing against, like their back is against the wall so they can't go back, right? Or do you find people who are really self-sufficient, protected, brilliant people, have thousands of options in the world and they can go do any job when things get hard, they can just quit it? Speaker 1 (15:27) Who are the better ones? Right. Blackmail's fatal. Blackmailing a person. I mean, one of the early days, I go back to my days as an article clerk, the people who were being blackmailed, they were rats. They were vicious. They were trying to fight back, but couldn't. So we had to fight back for them. If you blackmail someone, you are blackmailing a rat with a back to the wall. Speaker 1 (15:55) Totally unpredictable. So there's no way that works. Speaker 2 (16:01) So anyone who's in a situation where you can blackmail them, they're anyway not nice because they won't have integrity. Is that what you're saying? Speaker 1 (16:09) Oh, sure. Absolutely. I would not do anything to get out of being blackmailed. And I mean, a number of blackmailers have murdered people to get out of blackmail. Speaker 2 (16:19) So when these recruiters, they find everything about you, and you're exposed in front of them by the time you're recruited. Yes. Speaker 1 (16:27) Right. Speaker 2 (16:27) What are like one or two red flags, which is like, oh, we found this, we're not going to hire this person? Speaker 1 (16:33) Yeah, well, there are a number of them. And I don't think, I think it would be sort of giving away too much to say what are the red flags, but there are a number of red flags that the intelligence agencies look for. Speaker 1 (16:47) Okay. And Speaker 2 (16:48) what are the green flags if you can't give me the red flags? I'm happy Speaker 1 (16:52) with green Speaker 2 (16:53) flags. What do you look for? Oh, this is golden. I want to hire this person. Speaker 1 (16:58) Yeah, yeah, yeah. Well, I think I'm talking, I have to say I'm biased here because having worked with the age, as a lawyer, you're sort of of them but not with them. If you're with them, you're in trouble. You have to stand back. totally and look at them as clients dispassionately. But I can say this now that I can say, yeah, I was dispassionate. And sometimes, you know, there were decisions that didn't go well because they weren't very popular, because the operations that they might have put to me, absolutely brilliant. But one would have to say, well, hang on a minute, the balance of rights isn't quite right here. Not you can't do it, but let's try and do it this way so that you can get around the problem, which I think I can truthfully say we always manage to find a way through, largely because the officers, I mean, are totally brilliant. They think laterally. They're determined. They have a lot of patience. Some operations can take years to come to fruition. Speaker 1 (18:15) which again is different to the police who have to sort of act immediately. And there's always a tension between the police and the agencies. And the police and the agencies do have a fantastic sort of rapport, despite the fact the police have to act quick and we have to act slow sometimes. And balance, that ability to be balanced, to understand people, to understand how far you can go, how far you can't. Those are the really important qualities of an intelligence agent. Speaker 2 (18:49) Some Speaker 1 (18:50) people may say courage, but I find courage something very difficult to deal with because I honestly don't think anybody finds out whether they're courageous until they have to. Speaker 2 (19:02) Nice. Speaker 2 (19:04) Fair. Yeah, I think so. And you're only courageous situationally. Speaker 1 (19:08) Yeah, that's absolutely right. Yeah. And, you know, people have courage for one thing and absolutely not for another. Exactly. So there we go. Yes. So that's that is those are the people I worked with. And I think it was the greatest privilege I've ever had, except marrying my wife. Speaker 1 (19:33) So you've worked with Americans, right? Yes, yes, a lot. And Speaker 2 (19:37) compare American intelligence, CIA, versus British intelligence, MI6. Speaker 2 (19:46) What are the differences? What are the powers? Who's more powerful? What are the similarities? Speaker 1 (19:52) I think the way I'd like to approach it is that the cooperation is massive. And despite the fact that America seems to be pushing in one direction and we're slightly going in the other direction, which incidentally, I see a lot of reason for. just going into square brackets for a moment. I mean, for instance, I think America's absolutely right. to demand that we pay more for NATO. I mean, really and truly, the European nations, including the UK, have got away with murder for years, not paying sufficient for NATO. And America's right to demand that. And we need to step up to the plate to do that. And if that takes a bit of biting on the bullet, then we have to do it. Because at the moment, we need to. We can't appear to be weak. Speaker 1 (20:49) So, I think, therefore, that underlying that, the two agencies get on very, very well. They speak the same language, and I don't mean literally. They both understand how they operate. The UK... The UK operates still under a broader range of secrecy, which I disagree with. I mean, for instance, we have oversight, which is important. What do you mean? Oh, right. Good point. Oversight. Yeah, right. Speaker 1 (21:26) When we set up the legislation for the agencies, we gave them the power to act criminally, provided they had approval of one sort or another. Speaker 2 (21:36) So Speaker 1 (21:36) in other words, you could commit a crime by entering somebody's property, for instance, by stealing their documents or that sort of thing. And one could get authorization for that legally. Well... That's all very well and good. You had to operate under the umbrella of necessity. Whatever you did had to be necessary for the protection of the state. And it had to be proportional. So what you were doing had to be proportional to what you were investigating. Does that make sense? Speaker 2 (22:11) Yeah. Speaker 1 (22:13) Well, that's great. So here you have a sort of organisation that has this legislative base. It's got some rules. Who's going to oversee them? Speaker 1 (22:26) Whether they're following the rules or no. Exactly. You've got to. You cannot trust. I mean, from my perspective, yes, you can, because I've seen them operate. And as I've told you how they operate. But... The general populace shouldn't be asked to believe that they've let loose this sort of canon. It's not controlled. Speaker 2 (22:50) So there is oversight. Speaker 1 (22:52) Because Speaker 2 (22:53) that is scary. That is scary. If you give an intelligence officer power to walk into anyone's house, steal a document, and be not accountable for it just by writing one line that, hey, it was necessary to do, I did it. Absolutely. Well, look at what Putin's... As a citizen, it makes me fearful about my own people. Speaker 1 (23:15) Yeah, sure. The UK has a parliamentary oversight body that can interview the heads of agencies and others about what they're doing and what they're up to. But much more important, they also have an investigative group that goes in and... checks whether or not what the heads of the agencies are telling this oversight body are true. So you've got a double layer. Then on top of that, if the agencies want to insert surveillance equipment in a property, for instance, Speaker 1 (24:00) they have to get permission from a judge. Or if they intercept someone's telecommunications, they have to get permission from a judicial commissioner, which is a judge. Really, really important. And that was hard fought because when I was there, it had to be done by a minister. My argument was, well, that's no good because your minister is biased. Speaker 1 (24:26) Bound to be. Yeah. And therefore, we are damaging ourselves by insisting on having a, well, we didn't, the government did, by having a minister do it because ministers like to control. So we got them out of the picture by going to a judge, which was really, really important and pleased me enormously. So. That's that layer. Then there's a third layer. If you're walking down the street and you think you're being followed by an intelligence agent of MI5 or MI6, if Speaker 2 (25:00) you think Speaker 1 (25:01) that, you can complain to the investigations commissioner. Speaker 1 (25:09) for the MI5 and MI6 that you believe you are being interfered with, that your private life is being interfered with. It has to be investigated. Now that, I think, that for me is sufficient. There's only one area that I think needs more, and that is I don't think the public see enough of the heads of agencies. Speaker 2 (25:36) So that's an oversight in British intelligence. Yeah. That's not there in American? Speaker 1 (25:42) Yes, yes, yes. And curiously enough, I was going on to say, by saying the British public don't see enough of the heads of agencies, in America, they have open sessions with the Intelligence Oversight Committee. And their use of the public is entitled to see the heads of agencies answering awkward questions. But that is right. They should have to answer all the questions. So right Speaker 2 (26:07) now, all of this in UK happens, everything inside a bubble. Inside a bubble. It's not publicly portrayed. Well, Speaker 1 (26:16) it's Speaker 2 (26:16) publicly Speaker 1 (26:17) portrayed in a report. Okay. But it's not Speaker 2 (26:20) shown, like live action is Speaker 1 (26:21) not shown. No, it's not shown. Speaker 2 (26:22) And in America, it's live recorded and shown. Yes, Speaker 1 (26:25) absolutely. And I believe it should be live recorded in the UK as well. You don't have to go into secret secrets. But you do go into policy and areas that can be explained. For instance, how do we deal with terrorism? How is ISIS dealt with? How do we deal with homegrown terrorists much more openly in front of the parliamentary oversight committee? Speaker 2 (26:51) That CIA does better. Yeah, Speaker 1 (26:54) absolutely. Speaker 2 (26:56) Is it true that an MI5... Speaker 1 (27:00) investigating officer or an intelligence officer cannot arrest a citizen. Yeah, that's up to the police. Quite right too. Speaker 2 (27:07) So an intelligence officer, if they're coming and actually scaring you to get information out of you, we should not be scared because they can't arrest? Speaker 1 (27:18) Can't arrest. Speaker 2 (27:20) But a CIA officer can, or an FBI can as well. Speaker 1 (27:23) FBI can. Speaker 2 (27:24) But MI5 is equivalent to FBI, right? No, Speaker 1 (27:27) well... Yes, in the sense that it deals with homegrown problems. But the FBI have the power of arrest. We rely on the police to do that. I think it's a very sort of British thing. You know, the idea that you have this secret agency creeping around can arrest people. No, no, no. That, again, is a sort of hold back. Speaker 2 (27:52) But why? Why can an intelligence officer arrest you? They can't. But why? Why can't they? Shouldn't they be allowed to do it if they have found someone very risky for the state? Speaker 1 (28:04) No, absolutely not. I mean, they can make a private arrest, which is a curious British anomaly. As a private citizen, they could arrest someone. But no, if there is to be an arrest that's done by a police officer, then the matter can... you know, proceed to the Crown Prosecution Service and go