Skip to main content

SUPO National Security Assessment 2019: Dozens of Spies in Finland


The Finnish Security and Intelligence Service SUPO was transformed into a full-blown intelligence agency when the new intelligence laws for military and civilian intelligence were passed this summer. In the new role SUPO can now engage in activities like network traffic intelligence and intelligence operations abroad. While the new powers are not yet fully utilized, SUPO's situational awareness should have improved a lot in the recent months.

SUPO recruitment poster

On December 5, 2019 SUPO published its annual assessment of the Finland’s security situation. It splits the Finnish security environment into four areas:
  •           Foreign intelligence activity targeting Finland and Finns
  •           Cyber espionage
  •           Threat of terrorism in Finland
  •           Hybrid threats


SUPO openly states that the most active intelligence agencies operating in Finland are Russian and Chinese. There are dozens of intelligence operatives permanently stationed in Finland. The focus of these agencies are:
  •          Finding influence vectors within the Finnish society
  •          Anticipating strategic decisions made by Finland
  •          Finnish relations with EU, NATO and individual countries
  •          Finnish critical infrastructure
  •          Cybersecurity measures and systems
  •          Industrial espionage on hi-tech companies


The report also mentions that several unnamed countries are conducting intelligence and coercion operations against their citizens living in Finland. It’s widely known that at least Turkey and Iran are trying to intimidate its expats into following regime policies, even if the countries are not mentioned in the report. Report expects the foreign intelligence activity within Finland to remain on the high level or even increase.


There is also an increased amount of cyber espionage and sabotage operations detected. While direct damages have been minimal, it’s expected that these operations continue to proliferate and SUPO is putting considerable amount of resources into combating them.

The threat of terrorism in Finland remains elevated. The biggest threats are lone wolves following extremist Islamist ideologies and naturally the returning ISIS jihadists, whose return cannot be blocked under the current legislation. The report doesn’t state any other terrorist threats besides the jihadists.

Hybrid influencing and operations are mentioned rather vaguely, but its clear that there is significant number of influencing operations going on. Some target the political leadership and economic decision makers. The spectrum of operations is broadening and while the operations are low intensity and long term in nature, there is a real possibility of rapidly ramping them up if needed, with possibly crippling results.

The overall tone of the short report is that Finland is under significant pressure, but not directly attacked, yet. The main threat to Finnish national security is Russia, while China and the Jihadists pose more limited threats to certain areas of the society.

Labels:

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Quick guide to identifying the Russian tanks Part 1: main platforms and T-72 variants

As most of the western nations have reduced their inventories to a few or mostly one type of main battle tank model in their active inventories, the myriad of tank platforms and distinct versions employed by the Russian armed forces may feel overwhelming. Here is a quick guide to identifying Russian MBTs. When you come across an image (or the actual thing), follow the steps to identify it properly. Family of the tank Russian Armed Forces currently operates, or at least storage, the following tank platforms/families: -           T-55 (<2000 in storage) -           T-62 (2000 in storage) -           T-64 (2000 in storage) -           T-72 (2000 active duty, 8000 in storage) -           T-80 (2000 active duty, 5000 in storage) -           T-90 (350 active duty, 600  in storage) -           T-14 (20 in field testing) So how can you identify what type of a tank are you looking at? There are two features that can be used to distingu
4 comments
Read more

The Hammer and the Sickle - Potential Russian Pincer-Offensive

For the past weeks the social media has been filled with sightings of Russian troops moving towards the regions bordering Ukraine. The buildup was initially called an exercise, but in the most recent press releases Kremlin has been rather clear that the troops have been deployed there as an operational deployment, if Russia feels a need to act upon any real or imaginary escalation in Donbass. The troops will stay in the region as long as President Putin sees it necessary. Russia Serna-Class landing crafts of the Caspian flotilla The initial buildup was focused on occupied Crimea that has so far received an additional VDV airborne regiment, multiple mechanized battalion tactical groups and heavy artillery units equipped with at least the enormous 240mm 2S4 Tulpan mortars.  Additional trains and convoys have been spotted in Rostov, Krasnodar and Voronezh regions. The Russian controlled Belarusian military has also been alerted and multiple, very Russian looking units are operating in the
2 comments
Read more

Russian Battalion Tactical Group southbound from Saint Petersburg

  A social media video of a Russian train loaded with military vehicles surfaced 20.8.2020. The video was supposedly filmed south of Saint Petersburg. While videos of Russian convoys and trains laden with tanks are not rare, there are some interesting features in this one. It seems to feature a fully functional Russian battalion tactical group. The maneuver unit is clearly based around a motorized rifle battalion that is equipped with the venerable MT-LB tracked armored personnel carriers. In the Russian system a Motorized Rifle unit can be classified as either mechanized or motorized in the west depending on the set of vehicles it is equipped with. This battalion has at least 35 baseline MT-LBs, which is consistent with the 3 vehicles per platoon and 3 platoons + ATGM-section per company structure that is typical with the battalions of the motorized rifle brigades.   The battalion also has its integral command and communications assets in the form of two R-149 unified command
5 comments
Read more