Jack Barsky

Barsky was born Albrecht Dittrich in East Germany in 1949; a Young Pioneer and member of the Communist Party, he won the Karl Marx Scholarship in 1970 and was headed for a career as a chemistry professor.⁠[1]

By his account, in 1970 a Stasi officer came to his dormitory in Jena and a KGB officer then took over; in 1973, in East Berlin, he accepted an undercover assignment.⁠[2]

He briefly taught chemistry and mathematics at Friedrich Schiller University Jena, then underwent four and a half years of training in Berlin and Moscow before being sent on an undercover assignment to the United States.⁠[3]

On October 8, 1978, he arrived at Chicago’s O’Hare International Airport under the Dyson identity, a forged Canadian identity created by the KGB, and later dropped it to become Jack Barsky.⁠[4]

The Barsky name was not one he chose; KGB personnel found it as the identity of a boy buried in a cemetery in Maryland.⁠[5]

In New York he worked as a bike messenger; he said his mission was to spot Americans who might spy for the Soviets, and that “The gold mine was college.”⁠[6]

He graduated from Baruch College and took a job at MetLife in 1984.⁠[7]

He married his girlfriend in East Germany, with whom he had a son, and later married again in the United States and had a daughter.⁠[8]

In 1988 the KGB ordered him home; he refused, falsely claiming an illness that required treatment in the United States, and the KGB later told his wife in Germany that he had died.⁠[9]

He recalls that one winter morning in 1988, on a New York subway platform, a stranger whispered to him: “You must come home or else you’re dead.”⁠[10]

He said he stayed because of his young daughter: “I ended up watching that little girl grow up, and that changed everything.”⁠[5]

In the 1990s he worked for UnitedHealthcare and Prudential.⁠[7]

The FBI received a tip in the 1990s, bugged his house, and overheard him telling his wife about his KGB past.⁠[9]

In May 1997 the FBI stopped him at a toll bridge over the Delaware River without arresting him; he told everything, passed a polygraph, was not charged, and went on to brief the FBI and the National Security Agency on KGB operations.⁠[2]

He became a Christian in 2007 and was baptized in March 2008; he became a U.S. citizen in 2014. After “60 Minutes” aired his story in 2015, he decided to retire from corporate life to concentrate on his book and public appearances.⁠[3]

On March 21, 2017, Tyndale Momentum published Deep Undercover: My Secret Life and Tangled Allegiances as a KGB Spy in America, written with Cindy Coloma.⁠[4]

Kirkus Reviews called the book “An intriguing inside look at international espionage.”⁠[1]

By then he had moved from upstate New York to Covington, Georgia, spoke at religious and corporate events, and appeared on CNNCNNCNN (Cable News Network) is an Atlanta-based news organization founded by Ted Turner on June 1, 1980, as the world’s first 24-hour television news channel. It has been owned in turn by Turner Broadcasting System, Time Warner, AT&T and Warner Bros. Discovery, became part of Skydance Corporation along with Warner Bros. Discovery in October 2026, and is one of the five networks that rotate in the White House television pool.Open the full entry and MSNBCMS NOWMS NOW (My Source for News, Opinion and the World) is an American cable channel for political news and commentary. It was formerly MSNBC, launched in July 1996 as a joint venture of NBC and Microsoft, adopted its current name on November 15, 2025, as its business was spun off from Comcast, and since January 2026 has belonged to the independent public company Versant Media Group. It is known for its liberal-leaning commentary programs.Open the full entry to discuss Russia.⁠[7]

In April 2022 he said he had never met Putin but believed Putin had miscalculated in starting the war in Ukraine, adding: “I don’t think that anyone expected the Russian army to be as incompetent as they are.”⁠[6]

On May 27, 2022, he appeared on episode 158 of Monocle radio’s “The Big Interview,” recounting how he went from young East German scientist to undercover KGB agent and later American citizen.⁠[11]

On July 9, 2022, Barsky appeared on episode #301 of the Lex FridmanLex FridmanLex Fridman is a Soviet-born, US-raised computer scientist and podcast host who works as an MIT research scientist on human-AI interaction and autonomous driving. His Lex Fridman Podcast is known for hours-long conversations with guests including heads of state and technology leaders.Open the full entry Podcast; the outline lists topics including the KGB, communism, his childhood, becoming a KGB agent, training, spying in America, Putin and the war in Ukraine, Yuri Bezmenov, the FSB and the CIA, and quitting the KGB.⁠[12]

His personal website, titled Barsky Intelligence, describes him as a former KGB illegal and FBI advisor and as managing partner of Barsky Intelligence, offering keynotes and advisory services.⁠[13]

The Agent, a 12-episode podcast about his story produced by Imperative Entertainment and narrated by Alden Ehrenreich, lists Barsky among its executive producers.⁠[14]

Personal website: Public link: https://jackbarsky.com/ (opens in a new window)⁠[12]

X: Public account: https://x.com/deepcoverbarsky (opens in a new window)⁠[12]