C.I.A.
Seal of the Central Intelligence Agency
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Flag of the Central Intelligence Agency
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| Intelligence agency overview | |
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| Formed | September 18, 1947 |
| Preceding Intelligence agency | |
| Headquarters |
George Bush Center for Intelligence Langley, Virginia, U.S. |
| Motto | "The Work of a Nation. The Center of Intelligence." Unofficial motto: "And you shall know the truth and the truth shall make you free." (John 8:32) |
| Employees | 21,575 (estimate) |
| Annual budget | $15 billion (as of 2013[update]) |
| Intelligence agency executives | |
| Parent Intelligence agency | None (independent) |
| Website | cia |
The Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) is a civilian foreign intelligence service of the United States federal government, tasked with gathering, processing and analyzing national security information from around the world, primarily through the use of human intelligence (HUMINT). As one of the principal members of the U.S. Intelligence Community (IC), the CIA reports to the Director of National Intelligence and is primarily focused on providing intelligence for the President and Cabinet.
Unlike the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), which is a domestic security service, the CIA has no law enforcement function and is mainly focused on overseas intelligence gathering, with only limited domestic intelligence collection. Though it is not the only U.S. government agency specializing in HUMINT, the CIA serves as the national manager for coordination of HUMINT activities across the US intelligence community. Moreover, the CIA is the only agency authorized by law to carry out and oversee covert action at the behest of the President, unless the President determines that another agency is better suited for carrying out such action. It exerts foreign political influence through its tactical divisions, such as the Special Activities Division.
Before the Intelligence Reform and Terrorism Prevention Act, the CIA Director concurrently served as the head of the Intelligence Community; today the CIA is organized under the Director of National Intelligence (DNI). Despite transferring some of its powers to the DNI, the CIA has grown in size as a result of the September 11 attacks. In 2013, The Washington Post reported that in fiscal year 2010, the CIA had the largest budget of all IC agencies, exceeding previous estimates.
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