Cover (intelligence gathering)

A cover in foreign, military or police human intelligence or counterintelligence is the ostensible identity and role or position in an infiltrated organization assumed by a covert agent during a covert operation.

In espionage, an official cover operative is one who assumes a position in an organization with diplomatic ties to the government for which the operative works such as an embassy or consulate. This provides the agent with official diplomatic immunity, thus protecting them from the severe punishments normally meted out to captured spies. Upon discovery of an official cover agent's secret hostile role, the host nation often declares the agent persona non grata and orders them to leave the country.

Official cover operatives are granted a set of governmental protections, and if caught in the act of espionage, they can request diplomatic protection from their government. In other words, official cover operatives are agents officially recognized by their country.^{[citation needed]}

In espionage, operatives under non-official cover (NOC) are operatives without official ties to the government for which they work who assume covert roles in organizations. Another term often used is deep cover, which Oxford English Dictionary defines as "designating an intelligence agent whose real identity and allegiance are thoroughly protected."

This is in contrast to an operative with official cover, where they assume a position in their government, such as the diplomatic service, which provides them with diplomatic immunity if their espionage activities are discovered. Operatives under non-official cover do not have this "safety net", and if captured and charged as spies are subject to severe criminal punishments, up to and including execution. Operatives under non-official cover are also usually trained to deny any connection with their government, thus preserving plausible deniability, but also denying them any hope of diplomatic legal assistance – or official acknowledgment of their service. Such an operative or agent may be referred to as a NOC (pronounced /nɒk/ NOK) or as an illegal (see Clandestine HUMINT operational techniques). Sometimes, front companies or strawman entities are established in order to provide false identities for agents.

An agent sent to spy on a foreign country might, for instance, work as a businessperson, a worker for a non-profit organization (such as a humanitarian group), or an academic. For example, the CIA's Ishmael Jones spent nearly two decades as a NOC.

Many of the agents memorialized without names or dates of service on the CIA Memorial Wall are assumed to have been killed or executed in a foreign country while serving as NOC agents. In nations with established and well-developed spy agencies, most captured non-native NOC agents have, however, historically been repatriated through prisoner exchanges for other captured NOCs as a form of gentlemen's agreement.

Some countries have regulations regarding the use of non-official cover: the CIA, for example, has at times been prohibited from disguising agents as members of certain aid organizations, or as members of the clergy.^{[citation needed]}