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The FBI’s Confidential Human Source Policy Guide[1] also includes new or strengthened requirements and implements portions of the Sensitive Investigations Memorandum. Its requirements include:

  • Identifying the specific source-related activities in which FBI intelligence analysts and other non-agent personnel may engage.[2] For example, an intelligence analyst may only contact a CHS or a potential CHS in the presence of a case agent, and an analyst may only accompany an agent to a debriefing of a CHS with supervisory approval.[3]
  • Requiring information about “[a]ll likely motivations the CHS could have for providing information.”[4]
  • Enhancing the requirements for source validation reviews.
  • Requiring detailed information and additional approvals in a request to reopen a CHS who was previously closed for cause, either by the FBI or another agency.[5]

Finally, the CHS Policy Guide requires a CHS to be treated as “sensitive” and thus subject to more controls based on either the position the source holds or the position held by someone the source is reporting on.[6] So, for example, even though a CHS may not hold a position in a campaign, if the source is reporting on such a person he/she would still be treated as sensitive. Post-Crossfire Hurricane, the Guide now provides this example:

A CHS with indirect access to a U.S. Presidential campaign is tasked to report on campaign activities involving possible cooperation with foreign entities to influence the outcome of a U.S. Presidential election. The CHS had only indirect access, but his or her affiliation nevertheless enabled the CHS to be tasked to collect information on the campaign.[7]

c. Defensive briefings

The OIG’s review of Crossfire Hurricane discusses defensive briefings for those who may be targets of nefarious activities by foreign powers and, specifically at the time of the

  1. ↑ FBI, Confidential Human Source Policy Guide (Dec. 15, 2021) (hereinafter “CHS Policy Guide”).
  2. ↑ Id. §§ 2.2.3; 2.2.3.1.
  3. ↑ Id. § 2.2.3.1.
  4. ↑ Id.
  5. ↑ Id. §§ 4.3; 4.5.1; see also § 4.5.2 (when a closed CHS from one field office is opened in another, the new office “must promptly be provided with any information that reflects negatively upon the reliability of the CHS”).
  6. ↑ See id. § 7.19; see also § 6.1 (explaining § 7.19). There is also now a requirement for approval by the Assistant Director of Intelligence. See § 7.19.2.1 (requiring an electronic communication to the Assistant Director of the Directorate of Intelligence before the approval request goes to the Director and the Department).
  7. ↑ Id. § 7.19.1.3.

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