Artificial intelligence is fundamentally reshaping the landscape of espionage, giving intelligence agencies new capabilities to identify and cultivate human sources while simultaneously arming adversaries with synthetic identities and deepfakes that are increasingly difficult to detect. Jonna Mendez, a 27-year veteran of the Central Intelligence Agency and its former chief of disguise, said in a recent interview that the same AI tools empowering intelligence agencies are now being turned against institutions and their employees.
Speaking on the sidelines of the Infosecurity Europe 2026 conference in London, Mendez described an escalating threat environment where modern espionage extends far beyond hacking and data breaches. She cited a case where a North Korean operative posing as a young American technology professional secured a remote job at a US cybersecurity firm, only to be unmasked by an AI agent. “The way to protect yourself is to find the soft spots,” Mendez said. “Where are adversaries coming in? How are they convincing people inside governments and companies to talk? That is where you need to dig and figure it out.”
From Cold War Masks to AI-Driven Deception
Mendez, who oversaw the development of animated masks so convincing they fooled President George H.W. Bush during a White House briefing in the early 1990s, noted that the core objective of intelligence work remains unchanged: convincing a person to cooperate and share information unobtainable by other means. She projected a photograph of herself wearing such a mask at that briefing, undetected by everyone in the room. She also described a Cold War technique called “disguise on the run,” used in Moscow, where a CIA officer transformed from a diplomat in a suit to an elderly Russian pensioner while walking through a forest to avoid detection near a nuclear communications cable.
Asked whether rival powers such as China have adopted and advanced CIA tradecraft in disguise and surveillance, Mendez said she had been out of the field too long to offer a confident assessment. However, she noted that mask technology developed during her tenure could still be effective against modern cameras depending on lighting conditions. China has built one of the world’s most extensive surveillance infrastructures, with an estimated 700 to 800 million cameras blanketing its cities, combined with facial recognition and multiple data streams to create what authorities call “city brains.” These systems can track individuals across urban areas in real time and automatically flag anomalies.
“The intelligence community in Washington has been concerned, really concerned about how AI will impact our intelligence operations,” Mendez said. “Its ability to scoop up all the information about a particular individual, information that we would never be able to use otherwise, is going to be very helpful.” She explained that before AI, agencies could already gather background data on targets—where they lived, marital status, number of children, type of house, car, and finances. AI has taken that capability to another level, sweeping up vast amounts of personal data to build a fuller picture of a target, with the ultimate goal of befriending rather than confronting them and winning their trust.
Five Eyes Warns of Chinese Fake Headhunters
The Five Eyes intelligence partnership—comprising agencies from Australia, Canada, New Zealand, the United Kingdom, and the United States—released a joint bulletin on June 3 titled “Safeguarding Our Secrets,” warning that Chinese military intelligence services are using professional networking sites and online job platforms to target individuals with access to classified or privileged information. The bulletin said operatives pose as recruiters, consultants, or representatives of think tanks and private firms, posting job advertisements related to foreign policy, defense, international trade, and Indo-Pacific security to lure targets into applying. It noted that Chinese recruiters have shifted away from directly approaching individuals on LinkedIn, instead ranking applicants’ resumes by their likely access to sensitive information. Defense, foreign affairs, intelligence, and technology workers were identified as prime targets, alongside military personnel, academics, journalists, and think-tank employees.
A spokesperson for the Chinese Embassy in the UK responded, stating: “The allegation of so-called ‘Chinese espionage threat’ is entirely fabricated and constitutes malicious slander. We strongly condemn this. The Five Eyes are the world’s largest intelligence network. Its members have engaged in unscrupulous espionage and intelligence-gathering activities around the globe. Their activities are the real threat to peace-loving countries.”
Mendez did not directly address the Five Eyes warning but said the combination of AI, deepfakes, and social media has created fertile ground for deception. She emphasized that the same tools that empower intelligence agencies are now being used by adversaries to target governments and companies, complicating the spy wars between the US and its rivals in ways with no clear precedent. For more on how narrative tools shape strategy, see our analysis of Decoding Xi Jinping's Speeches. Meanwhile, concerns about drone-based espionage are also rising, as highlighted in Mysterious Drone Swarms Over US Nuclear Base Raise Espionage Fears.
