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📄 Official representative 🕵️ A spy
foreign agent

foreign agent

2 7.5
A person who secretly gathers and gives information to another country
  • noun
  • /ˈfɔrɪn ˈeɪdʒənt/
translation icon : agente extranjero
  • They're assuming this man is a foreign agent.

Examples

  • And he gets arrested and they accuse him of weapons sales, of not registering as a foreign agent, and of lying to the FBI.

  • Is she proven to be some kind of foreign agent?

    Blog text (28)

  • You are a foreign agent.

    The Promise (2016)

  • "Do you think they met a foreign agent?"

    Fiction book (1997)

  • So having said that, I'm now considered a foreign agent, right?

  • Do you believe it's possible that Joe Turner was a foreign agent?

    Happy Thanksgiving (2024)

  • If they cheat him in again, there will be those who will arrest him for being a foreign agent.

    Blog text (5)

  • But, Aleksei, how does that make him a foreign agent?

    Firefox (1982)

  • Surveillance in cases targeting suspected foreign agents previously had to be approved by a special court.

    Blog text (8)

  • The government has launched an investigation into the activities of several foreign agents operating within the country.

Synonyms

spy
vsforeign agent
623 2.9

A person who secretly collects information for a government or company

works similarly but serves a government of another country
mole
vsforeign agent
82 8.2

A person who secretly works inside an organization to pass information to an enemy

does the same but answers to a government of another country
fifth columnist
vsforeign agent
1 9.9

A person who secretly helps an enemy inside their country

focuses on secret information gathering for another country's government
agent-in-place
vsforeign agent
  • Jargon
8.9

A person who works secretly inside another group to get information

acts similarly but serves a government from another country

Surface Forms

foreign agent singular
foreign agents plural

Morphology

foreign + agent

The noun phrase is compositionally built: a B1 learner who knows 'foreign' (relating to other countries) and 'agent' (a representative or actor) can infer 'an agent associated with foreign interests/countries'. While the full legal sense of formal designation and reporting is a technical extension, the core meaning is directly predictable and cross-linguistically common.

Etymology

Foreign agent comes from the image of an agent, a person who acts for someone else, secretly working for a foreign country. Such a person would 'collect and pass secret information', so today the phrase means 'a spy working for another country'.