The Intelligence Community has been something that has intrigued the American People since the creation of James Bond. The thought of spies has personally interested me since I was young, and this past year I had the opportunity to take a class titled Spies and Lies, Intel and Security which showed me insight into the intelligence community.

So here are seven facts about the intelligence community that came from my textbook for my class.

1. The NSA records 650 million events daily.

This is statistic is according to the Department of Defense and doesn't include metadata program.

2. There are three levels of classifications.

Confidential means that it could cause damage to the national security. Secret means that it could cause serious damage to the national security. Top Secret means that it could cause exceptionally grave damage to the national security.

3. In 2014, the USPS approved the request law enforcement to monitor the mail of 50,000 people.

These requests were allowed due to the fact these people had backgrounds of criminal history that threatened national security.

4. Clergy and Peace Corp are off limits for cover jobs in the CIA.

If a CIA agent is overseas, their cover job cannot be one of these two positions, everything else is free game. The most common cover job is a journalist.

5. The CIA created a Hepatitis vaccination program as an attempt to get Bin Laden's DNA.

As a result of this when they were discovered dozens of public health workers were killed even though they were not involved.

6. During the Cold War, 80% of information was secret and 20% was public.

With tensions high between the US and Russia, there was a fight for intelligence. The intel was kept secret in hopes of having a leg up over Russia.

7. During the Cold War, Democrats and Republicans agreed on almost all intelligence policies.

During this time there needed to be cooperation between the parties, so there wasn't much debate on what was going down overseas.

All facts came from Intelligence From Secrets To Policy, 7th Edition by Mark M Lowenthal.

Lowenthal, Mark M. Intelligence: from Secrets to Policy. Congressional Quarterly Press, 2017.