On Friday, CIA is taking steps to make sure it’s better equipped to tackle these new threats, as it prepares for one of the largest reorganizations in its 67-year history.According to CIA Director John Brennan, workforce in which thousands of employees are likely to see changes in which departments they work for, the lines of authority they report to and even where they sit.
The CIA will also create a directorate focused exclusively on exploiting advances in computer technology and communications.
The Directorate of Digital Innovation will rank alongside the agency’s operations and analysis branches, and it will be responsible for missions ranging from cyber-espionage to the security of the CIA’s internal e-mail.
"Our ability to carry out our responsibilities for human intelligence and national security responsibilities has become more challenging" in today's digital world, Brennan said. "And so what we need to do as an agency is make sure we’re able to understand all of the aspects of that digital environment."
Brennan briefed a small group of reporters on the changes on Wednesday, on the condition they did not publish until he told CIA employees.
Competition between spy agencies and between units within agencies has led to "stove piping" of information that should have been widely shared and to critical information falling through bureaucratic cracks, Brennan and other U.S. intelligence officials said.
Brennan said, "I know there are seams right now, but what we’ve tried to do with these mission centers is cover the entire universe, regionally and functionally, and so something that’s going on in the world falls into one of those buckets".
The CIA currently operates at least two such interdisciplinary centers, covering counter-terrorism and counter-intelligence.
Reaction to the CIA reorganization was mostly positive, although some veterans acknowledged it will likely prompt bureaucratic friction within the spy agency.
Former CIA acting director and deputy director Michael Morell said, "I think that this will strengthen the CIA significantly over time".
The Directorate of Digital Innovation will perform a similar role, and absorb existing entities including the Open Source Center, which monitors Twitter and other social media sites for intelligence on such adversaries as the Islamic State, as well as the Information Operations Center, a secret organization that handles missions including cyber-penetrations and sabotage and is now the second-largest center at the CIA.
