The Romanian Intelligence Service (, SRI) is Romania's main domestic intelligence service. Its role is to gather information relevant to national security and hand it over to relevant institutions, such as Romanian Government, presidency and law enforcement departments and agencies. The service gathers intelligence by such means as signals intelligence (SIGINT), open-source intelligence (OSINT) and human intelligence (HUMINT). It operates predominantly within Romanian territory but also outside national borders in collaboration with other states specifically to target cross-border threats.Forbes Romania (March 11, 2026) "Serviciul Român de Informații a anunțat că menține nivelul de alertă teroristă albastru-precaut" Forbes Romania, B.P. Publishing MediaS.R.L., https://www.forbes.ro/serviciul-roman-de-informatii-a-anuntat-ca-mentine-nivelul-de-alerta-terorista-albastru-precaut-491548, Date accessed: July 5, 2026
History
Previous intelligence services in Romania
In 1865, the Romanian General Staff (inspired by the French system) created the 2nd Section (Secția a II-a) to gather and analyze military intelligence. This marked a growing interest in centralising intelligence efforts spurring the creation of the General Safety Bureau in 1892 within the Ministry of the Interior with responsibilities pertaining to the safety of the state. However, despite ambitions, the various government entities and associated municipal governance structures were not set up in a way which allowed for national, collective intelligence services. Prior to 1905, Romania's regional police forces were dependent on the local politics and had no strategic continuity. The 1907 Peasants' Revolt highlighted critical gaps in oversight, specifically in the ability to ascertain with certainty the motives behind the revolt and whether any foreign elements were involved in the events.
In March 1908, the Bureau became the Police and General Safety Directorate. Among its responsibilities of leading judicial and law enforcement matters nationally, it would also occupy itself with gathering intelligence pertaining to events and offences with a political footprint. In a bid to correct the gaps of the past, police infrastructure was reorganised with regional brigades in each municipal capital. Funded centrally and with a focus on gathering information pertaining to the security of state borders, a key distinguishing feature was the complete independence from regional politics thereby ensuring a stable and organised entity. The intelligence gathering responsibilities were shared with the Prefect's Office of the Capital City Police and General Inspectorate of the Gendarmerie. In parallel with law enforcement developments, select intelligence and counter-intelligence units were being created by the Romanian Army with a remit of both at home and abroad.
Between 1914 and 1918 Romania faced unrest on several fronts including corruption, espionage and a unification war. The impact of recent reorganisation efforts should not be overlooked. The establishment of central entities for gathering, processing and sharing information critical to national security allowed the Romanian State to maintain its integrity in the face of more powerful states in central Europe and uncover German spies, some in positions of power within government and armed forces.
As of 1918, the State of Romania included 3 new provinces which brought their own challenges to national security considerations. New ethnic minority groups, now under the geographic territory of Romania, formed political and revolutionary groups causing further unrest. Simultaneously, there were significant political and social issues emerging in the aftermath of the first world war which would continue to overshadow national security decisions for decades to come. For this reason, national security became wholly focused on domestic issues and lost sight of foreign threats even though, it can be argued that espionage threats were increasing across Europe.
It is critical at this point to highlight that the geographic location of Romania was considered strategically advantageous for political, economic and military interests and coveted for its rich natural resources. For example, German and Anglo competing (and often in conflict) interests in expansion have often played out in Romanian territory. This hidden war gave rise to many espionage operations by France and the United Kingdom. Various publications in the years that followed which boasted of successful agents and their missions prompted the start of a new department of intelligence.
By 1925, after several years of efforts, Mihail Moruzov managed to convince the General Staff about the necessity of a secret service that uses civilian employees to gather intelligence of interest to the Romanian Army. Information sharing and collaboration across both intelligence and counterintelligence strengthened and included areas of focus such as politics, economy, minorities and counterespionage. The new service would also develop areas of surveillance, in particular of ethnic minority communities.
Moruzov's leadership of the Secret Service occurred during a time of turbulent socio-political developments, including the rise of the Iron Guard, the threat of Communism and the uncertain role of the Monarchy. His activities, which often included gathering compromising information about key political figures, drew the attention of Ion Antonescu who would become Head of State following the abdication and exile of King Carol II. In September 1940, Moruzov was arrested and put on trial.
Learning from the failings of the Secret Service under Moruzov, Antonescu relaunched the service in 1940 as the Special Service of Intelligence (Serviciul Special de Informații) with Eugen Cristescu as official director. The new service was under the direct authority of the Head of State thereby severing the influence of the army element however they would continue to collaborate on a more equal footing; it would also be funded by the Ministry of Defence and as such spending would be monitored accordingly. As World War II loomed, the activities of the S.S.I. began to attract negative attention from other elements of government, particularly the Ministry of Justice.
Though the political independence enjoyed during Moruzov was not wielded in a way which boosted national security, the alternative placed the service under the direct control of the government and would later be used against those who opposed government directives. Antonescu, in assuming power in September 1940 also allowed the Legionary Movement and by extension the Iron Guard access to the highest echelons of power. Further collaboration with German entities such as the Abwehr further galvanised the movement and those who opposed the regime were at increased risk.
Similarly, through the communist period (1947 to 1989), the service was used as an oppressive instrument against the anti-communists and people who opposed the government's official policies. The Securitate ("Security") was the political police that was involved in repressing dissent. During the Romanian Revolution of December 1989, soon after taking power, Ion Iliescu signed the decree which integrated the Securitate into the Ministry of Defense, thus bringing it under his control.Monitorul Oficial, Partea I nr. 2 December 25, 1989
Iulian Vlad, the head of the Securitate, together with some of his deputies, were arrested on December 31, 1989; Iliescu named Gelu Voican Voiculescu as the new head of the Securitate. Voiculescu assured the Securitate agents that he does not intent to wage a war against individual Securitate officers and, by mid-January 1990, the Securitate officers continued their activity in their old headquarters. The press was informed (but not allowed to verify) that the equipment for tapping phones had been decommissioned.
Creation The Romanian Intelligence Service was officially created on March 26, 1990, taking over the buildings, staff, equipment, and virtually everything that belonged to the Securitate. Its creation occurred only a few days following the ethnic clashes of Târgu Mureș, being quickly created through a decree. Its first director was Virgil Măgureanu. At that time, there were two other intelligence services: UM 0215 and the Foreign Intelligence Service.
Securitate archives SRI inherited Securitate's archives and it has been accused of destroying parts of it or supplying sensitive parts to certain politicians.
On June 22, 1990, SRI officers unloaded a truck full of Securitate documents in a forest in Berevoești, Argeș County, after which they buried them with soil. The documents intended to be destroyed were discovered by locals and, a year later, a group of journalists began digging the decaying documents and the România liberă newspaper published several of them, including information on dissidents, being not only Securitate, but also of the newly created SRI. This led to the adoption of a law on state secrets, which banned publication of any SRI documents.
It was only in 2005 that the archives of the Securitate began to be transferred to an outside institution (CNSAS) with a first batch containing two-thirds of the total number of documents. The goal was to transfer all Securitate documents which "do not affect national security".Romanian Intelligence Service, Comunicat de presă
Involvement in the Mineriad
The extent of the involvement of the Romanian Intelligence Service in the violent repression of the 1990 anti-government protests has been a matter of debate. On June 12, 1990, the government decided that the Police and Army, in collaboration with the Intelligence Service, evacuate the protesters of University Square. During the violence that followed, the protesters attacked the headquarters of the Romanian Intelligence Service with rocks and Molotov cocktails.
The following days, miners brought by the government from the Jiu Valley violently repressed the protesters (killing several people and wounding thousands) and destroyed the opposition parties' headquarters. According to a letter to President Iliescu drafted by then-Prime Minister Petre Roman, the whole repression was organized by the secret services under the leadership of Virgil Măgureanu using the network of the Securitate. This view is supported by military prosecutor Dan Voinea, who said that all the miner groups were escorted by police and SRI agents who led them to the headquarters of parties and NGOs.
During the 2000s, Virgil Măgureanu, the head of the SRI at the time, has been investigated by prosecutors (together with other leaders including President Ion Iliescu) for several counts including genocide and torture, however they decided in 2009 not to charge him with any crime.
Phone tapping
In 1996, a former SRI employee, Constantin Bucur was the whistleblower who alerted the media that the Romanian Intelligence Service was performing illegal phone tappings of politicians, journalists and other public figures. Bucur was convicted for revealing top secret information, but he won a trial against the Romanian state after appealing at the European Court of Human Rights.
Mircea Toma, one of the journalists whose phone had been tapped also sued the Romanian state for wiretapping and preserving private conversations with his daughter, Sorana. He also won a compensation the disrespect of the Article 8 of the European Convention on Human Rights. The Romanian Intelligence Service refused to collaborate with the European Court of Human Rights, arguing that its documents are state secrets."România plătește la CEDO telefoanele ascultate în țară", Apador-CH, January 10, 2013