Washington Post, 3 July 2010: The Russian spy case that exploded into public view this week was preceded by nearly a decade of cat-and-mouse activities with the FBI, according to court documents and an interview with a senior U.S. official familiar with the case. . . . . A close examination of court documents indicates that by mid-2006 investigators had already searched the homes of four of the couples, planted microphones in at least three of their residences, regularly reviewed their encrypted computer messages, and videotaped meetings where money and equipment were exchanged . . . .
. . . . . Indeed, the investigation into the 11 alleged foreign agents appears to have been a case study in counterintelligence. As a matter of technique, the FBI and the CIA generally weigh the opportunity of gaining valuable counterintelligence against the danger of allowing subjects of interest to continue operating, lest they obtain U.S. intelligence or manage to flee.
In the Russian spy case, the counterintelligence gains could have included the names of Russian couriers and spy handlers, the names of Americans whom the Russians had sought to recruit, or knowledge of Russian espionage techniques and practices that could be employed in counterintelligence activities elsewhere in the world.
Already, the FBI has revealed enough information about the suspects to indicate that it may have gained valuable counterintelligence about Moscow’s spy operations. According to a Justice Department letter filed in U.S. District Court in New York, for example, the FBI has acquired and decrypted more than 100 messages exchanged between one couple, Richard and Cynthia Murphy, and the SVR, the Russian spy agency. Only about 10 of those messages were described in the criminal complaint against the Murphys, who reside in New Jersey.
Separately, the Yonkers, N.Y., apartment of Vicky Peleaz, a columnist for New York’s El Diario La Prensa, and Juan Jose Lazaro, a political science professor, was bugged in February 2002. Yet in court papers the Justice Department described only five conversations recorded inside the apartment over the intervening years. . . . .
. . . . . Since the arrests were announced, many observers have expressed puzzlement as to why spies would live, say, in Yonkers or work in real estate. But counterintelligence experts say the suspects’ chief role probably was as “spotters,” as they are known in the intelligence world. A spotter would select individuals who could be recruited to work for Russia, either through persuasion or entrapment.
[Agent-Navodchik – Talent-Spotting Agent
Intelligence service agent used to identify individuals in a target country who may be of interest as potential candidates for recruitments, to carry out an initial assessment and to create suitable conditions for an intelligence officer to make contact with them. Talent-spotting agents are recruited from people whose job or social position gives them the opportunity to have contact with the kinds of people in whom the intelligence service is interested. More SVR terms]
They were in “a good position for spotting possible recruitment targets for Russian intelligence,” Peter Earnest, a former CIA officer and now executive director of the International Spy Museum, said in a recent Washington Post online chat.
In a 2004 message, court papers say, Heathfield sent an encrypted message in which he spoke of making contact with a U.S. government employee who worked at a research facility and dealt with planning related to nuclear weapons development. A year after the search of Heathfield’s house, the FBI was able to intercept an SVR message to him reporting Moscow’s response to his presentation of potential sources.
“Agree with your proposal to use ‘Farmer’ to start building a network of students in D.C.,” the SVR wrote him, according to the court papers. The SVR went on: “Your relationship with ‘Parrot’ looks very promising as a valid source of info from US power circles. To start working on him professionally we need all available details on his background, current position, habits, contacts, opportunities, etc.” The personal information about “Parrot” would, in the normal course of the counterintelligence trade, be turned over to a trained recruiter in Russia who would “work on him professionally” — using Moscow Center’s terms. . . . .
