Deception and Misinformation

Abstract

The use of deception and misinformation programmes by companies seems highly attractive but must be treated with care and to be successful three conditions must be fulfilled.

A major task both of (national) intelligence and security authorities is to hamper the intelligence gathering of unfriendly powers. This is done not only by restricting their intelligence gathering activities, but also by inducing them to draw incorrect conclusions from such information they do acquire … Although it is not possible to prevent the enemy from acquiring some information, it is possible to ensure that the intelligence he does so acquire is misleading or false.¹