(Image Source: MSNBC)

BY NOE GANDILLOT

ANCHOR ZACH TOOMBS

The FBI had dubbed it “Operation Ghost Stories”. On Halloween, the Federal Bureau of Investigation released secretly-recorded tapes that show the notorious red-headed beauty Anna Chapman and other Russian spies at work before they got exposed in 2010. Here’s CNN:

“The FBI releases a treasure-trove of videos, photos and heavily-edited documents from Operation Ghost Stories, an undercover peek at our Russian spy ring collected and passed on information. How the FBI trailed them and finally cracked the operation” 

The tapes - released in response to a Freedom of Information Act request filed by the Associated Press feature the Russian spies in their daily routine : they are talking in coffee shops or shopping in New York City.

On its website --  the FBI explains that “the arrests of 10 Russian spies last year provided a chilling reminder that espionage on U.S. soil did not disappear when the Cold War ended.”

TIME agrees the operation is reminiscent of the Soviet era and should be taken as a serious warning by American authorities.

“The busted Russian spy ring (...) sent a clear message to U.S. intelligence agencies that Russian espionage was still alive and well, decades after the death of Cold War hostilities. The fact remains that the United States holds a wealth of knowledge that espionage endeavors the world over hope to infiltrate."

NBC, however, says the threat can hardly be taken seriously given the very unprofessional nature of the spies’ work - and prefers to joke about it.

“It seriously does seem like a James Bond movie, a really, really bad one. (...) If it seems kind of low-tech - guess what : for all their efforts, they never actually uncovered any secret, or anything much at all. ‘It just shows me amateurish type of espionage’”

A former KGB officer and journalist agrees saying there is nothing here that American counter-intelligence services can’t handle. He told The Daily Mail:

“Russia's intelligence services seem unable to shake their Soviet-era habits. (...)'The current practice of the Russian espionage agency is based on the practices which existed before 1945. It's so outdated.”