Honeytraps: Lonely, junior personnel are a clearer mark for spy agencies in the age of social media
Experts say social media has made it easier and less risky for spies to reach out to targets and extract information, because they are always operating from a distance. (Illustration by Suneesh K.)
If Pakistan’s Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) or another hostile foreign agency wants to get into the country’s classified underbelly today – the armed forces, defence research and space organizations – the online charms of a femme fatale, it seems, can produce astonishing results.
On June 17, a contractual employee of the Defence Research and Development Laboratory (DRDL) in Hyderabad was held for passing confidential information on India’s missile programme to an alleged ISI operative in Pakistan through social media.