Domestic Operatives

Obfuscation
Domestic operatives are citizens or residents recruited by foreign states to conduct influence operations from within their own countries, exploiting their local credibility and legal protections to advance foreign interests while obscuring the foreign origin of the campaigns.
Author
Affiliation

E. Rosalie Li

Information Epidemiology Lab

Published

February 17, 2026

Obfuscation

Domestic operatives are citizens or residents recruited by foreign states to conduct influence operations from within their own countries, exploiting their local credibility and legal protections to advance foreign interests while obscuring the foreign origin of the campaigns.

FIMI Taxonomy by Information Epidemiology Lab.

Citation

BibTeX citation:
@article{li2026,
  author = {Li, E. Rosalie},
  title = {Domestic {Operatives}},
  date = {2026-02-17},
  url = {https://fimi.infoepi.org/mechanisms/domestic-operatives.html},
  langid = {en}
}
For attribution, please cite this work as:
Li, E. Rosalie. 2026. “Domestic Operatives,” February. https://fimi.infoepi.org/mechanisms/domestic-operatives.html.