Historical Dictionary of United States Intelligence

It also authorized the director of the secret service to establish na-

tionwide electronic task forces to assist law enforcement, the private

sector, and academia in detecting and suppressing computer-based

crime; increased the statutory penalties for the manufacture, posses-

sion, dealing in, and passing of counterfeit U.S. or foreign obliga-

tions; and allowed protection of the nation’s financial systems. The

Department of Homeland Security(DHS) absorbed the secret ser-

vice on 1 March 2003.

SECRET SERVICE BUREAU. The Secret Service Bureau was the

Union’s short-lived intelligence organization created by Allan

Pinkertonin mid-1861. Because of Pinkerton’s self-styled intelli-

gence missions behind Confederate lines and his outlandish and du-

bious reports on Confederate movements, the Secret Service Bureau

quickly languished and simply disappeared without making much of

a contribution to the Union’s intelligence effort.

SECURITY POLICY BOARD.Established in 1994 by Presidential

Decision Directive (PDD) 29, it sought to develop government-wide

integrated security policies across a broad range of security disciplines,

from classification to personnel security. The Security Policy Board

was composed of prominent Americans outside of government who

brought an independent, nongovernmental, public interest perspective

to security policy initiatives and the intelligence community (IC). It

was also a national-level security policy committee, which provided

leadership, structure, and coherence to the U.S. government’s person-

nel, physical, technical, and procedural policy, practices, and proce-

dures. The Security Policy Board was abolished on 24 April 2001, pur-

suant to National Security Presidential Directive (NSPD) 1.

SELECT COMMITTEE ON INTELLIGENCE TO INVESTI-

GATE ALLEGATIONS OF ILLEGAL OR IMPROPER AC-

TIVITIES OF FEDERAL INTELLIGENCE AGENCIES. Im-

paneled in February 1975, the committee of the House of

Representatives had a mandate to investigate allegations of illegal

and improper activities by U.S. intelligence agencies, especially the

Central Intelligence Agency (CIA). Also known as the Pike Com-

mittee, after its chairman representative Otis Pike, it focused on the

cost of U.S. intelligence, its effectiveness, and its management. The

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