There are three different targets, each with it's own set of agent actions, that your agents can infiltrate :
Your own regions
Though not a real infiltration (as there is no risk, setting up an agent to do counterintelligence in your own region always succeeds), your own regions are also valid infiltration targets. Once you've set up an agent in your own region, he can now do counterintelligence and also try to detect / capture enemy agents that have infiltrated your nation.
Actions inside your own region :
Faking structural data
If you set up your agent to fake structural data, you can create the illusion of any region layout you like. You can even save and load presets or create a random layout. And once an enemy agent tries to acquire structural data for this region he may get the faked date instead of the real data, depending on the skill delta between the two agents. So if you put up a skilled agent in a region to fake information, an unskilled hostile agent will get the faked information most of the time.
Faking division data
This is similar to faking structural data, with all it's features (presets, randomization), but your agent will try to fake division data. So you can e.g. fake a strong division in a region where no real division is deployed, making your enemy avoid this region.
Detecting and catching enemy agents
No matter how your agent is set up, he can try to detect all enemy agents infiltrated into this region. And once he has detected them, he can try to catch them. The chance of detecing and catching enemy agents depends on the agents' skill delta.
During a battle : Disable enemy units
If the region your agent is assigned to gets attacked, he'll also get involved in the battle. At the beginning of each turn he'll try to disable enemy units so they are disabled for the current turn, rendering them useless to the enemy. So placing a skilled agent in your bordering regions can be good idea to lower an enemy's attacking force.
Hostile regions
Once your agent has infiltrated an enemy region a slew of espionage and sabotage actions will be available, and especially a skilled agent will be able to deal a lot of damage and troubles for the region's owner.
Actions inside hostile regions :
Acquire regional / structural data
This espionage option will gather all regional factors as well as structural data, opening up sabotage actions (depending on the agent's level). The quality of this data depends on the agent's espionage skill, so a skilled agent is more likely to get correct data and will also be able to detect more buildings.
Acquire division data
The agent tries to detect the deployed region, and if a region is deployed, acquires it's strength and units. The qualit of this data also depends on the agent's espionage skill.
Do sabotage
A list of available sabotage actions is displayed at the bottom of the window. These actions carry a high risk but may also do severe damage to the hostile region. Depending on the action you may have to select a target building first, making it necessary to have up-to-date structural data.
Hostile data net
Infiltrating a hostile data net offers you access to all important areas of information, providing you with valuable information for your strategical decissions, as well as offering sabotage options. The data net is divided into three different levels (outer, inner, core), with the higher levels giving you higher precision while getting the data.
The first infiltration step only enters the outer data net, offering you the least precise data aquisition as well as basic sabotage options. In order to enter the next data net level you'll have to start a transition (button atop the grid between the two levels). This is a normal action with a risk factor, and if this action succeeds your agent will unlock new options and is also able to enter the next data net level.
In addition to this you can always take a look at past data aquisitions by clicking on the "show data" button that'll open up the data display window.
Note that data net agents can't be captured, so they'll never be lost. But if an action fails, the agent will be removed from the current level (e.g. getting caught in the core level will move the agent back to the inner level), locked and the data net alert level of the enemy nation is increased. This alert level notifies the enemy of supsicious actions in his data net and higher levels result in higher risk factors for your agents.
Data net alert level
One special addition to the data net espionage is the alert level. Each nation's data net has it's own alert level, and everytime an action inside that data net fails, that alert level is raised. It's divided into four levels (1 = low, 4 = high) that force penalties for actions. So the same action may have a higher risk of failure for a nation with a high data net level than for a nation with a low data net level. So if you've failed too many actions inside an enemy data net it's always a good idea to wait some turns as this level will slowly drop again.
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