Many of our blogs use the term confidential informant. This is because a significant amount of our readership uses that term. A much better term (adopted a number of years ago by the FBI) is that of Human Source. There is a story that the FBI first heard the term from the police in Canada. The term Human Source is widely used in the United Kingdom, Canada, Australia and many parts of Europe. Here is a simple definition.
A human source is a person who has been deliberately recruited and is managed to collect information to satisfy an intelligence requirement.
There are four key elements:
Deliberately recruited. The agency has made a conscious decision to utilize this person as a human source.
Managed. The person is managed. Implicit in this our the ideas of control and having a systematic approach to what takes place.
To collect information. Their job is to get information - not intelligence, and not evidence. The information they provide will be processed into intelligence and will be used to gain evidence. We use witnesses for evidence!
To satisfy an intelligence requirement. We don’t manage human sources just because we can. We manage sources because they can help satisfy intelligence requirements as clearly identified by the Chief of Police, the Sheriff or whoever else is in charge of an agency.
If you want to know more about human source management, just get in touch Email: info@hsmtraining.com or telephone + 44 7739 370 969
