The world’s most powerful intelligence organization is openly encouraging Russian citizens to spy on their own country.
The US Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) posted a 2 minute video on its official YouTube, Twitter, and Telegram channels on Monday.
The professionally produced Russian language video urges individual Russians to provide intelligence on their country in the midst of the Ukraine war.
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A CIA official said: “We want to reach those brave Russians who feel compelled by the Russian government’s unjust war to engage CIA and ensure they do so as securely as possible”
Meanwhile the Kremlin responded on Tuesday BY saying that its agencies were tracking Western spy activity.
Summit News reports: The video has a ‘patriotic’ orientation, assuring Russians they can do something to improve their country and its situation by handing over intelligence to the CIA.
“The CIA wants to know the truth about Russia, and we are looking for reliable people who can tell us that truth,” the agency said in the video, according to a translation. “Your information may be more valuable than you know.”
The text on the screen of the clip further tells Russians to “Contact us. Perhaps the people around you don’t want to hear the truth. We want to.”
Some of the narration includes the following messaging, according to a description:
n the video – published on the CIA’s official YouTube channel and the Telegram messaging app, popular in Russia – a male voice reflects on the meaning of heroism and endurance as lone individuals are seen weighing their decisions: a man trudging through snow, a woman staring through a window.
We are easily swayed by lies. But we do know what our reality is. The reality we live in. And the reality we talk about in whispers,” the voice says.
At the end, a man and a woman are shown in separate scenes with their fingers hovering over mobile phone screens with a link saying “Contact CIA”.
“This is my Russia. This will always be my Russia. I will endure. My family will endure. We will live with dignity because of my actions,” the narrator concludes.
The video at the end informs viewers how to submit information with a Tor browser utilizing the dark web and suggests tools for encrypted communications.
Accrding to Sky News, a Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman suggested authorities in Russia would be able to track people if they followed the CIA video’s instructions.
She called the video “a very convenient resource for tracking applicants”.
Dmitry Peskov, a spokesman for Russian President Vladimir Putin, said in response to the video: “I am convinced that our special services are properly monitoring this space.”
