Technical Intelligence - National-level Policy

National-level Policy

The US Economic Espionage Act of 1996 criminalizes two kinds of activity, which may be done either by foreign powers for (18 U.S.C. § 1831–1839) makes the theft or misappropriation of a trade secret a federal crime. To some extent, the Act addresses an international problem, but not all countries regard unauthorized technology transfer as illegal, when done for commercial purposes. Technology transfer that involves militarily critical technologies are more commonly a matter

This law contains two provisions criminalizing two sorts of activity:

1. Theft of trade secrets to benefit foreign powers
2. Theft of trade secrets for commercial purposes

Categorizing an individual act can be complex, as some national intelligence services have provided scientific and technical intelligence to private firms based in their countries. It becomes even more complex when the information is provided to an organization partially or fully owned by that government, and that organization competes in commercial markets. Other complexities arise when the information is not actually stolen, but where the foreign intelligence service (or business) buys one copy of a high-technology product, and then reverse engineers its technology to use in its own products. End user license agreements forbidding reverse engineering are common in software, but less so in other business areas.

Violation of export controls may overlap with information acquisition, or the exported equipment or materials may themselves be things difficult for the offending country to produce.

According to the US National Counterintelligence Executive (NCIX), 108 countries tried to obtain US technology in fiscal year 2005. Most of the effort, however, centered around a small number of countries. NCIX named China and Russia among this small number, "just as they have since the CI Community first began systematically tracking foreign technology collection efforts in 1997." By no means, however, is the US the only target, nor are China and Russia the only countries trying to obtain such information. In 2003, Sweden expelled two Russian diplomats over accusations of spying at Ericsson, a major electronics manufacturer whose products include avionics for Swedish Gripen fighter aircraft. Even more sensitive, however, is scientific and technical information-gathering by allies, such as Japan, France, and Israel.