The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) is the principal law enforcement agency and a national security service of the federal government. The FBI is housed under the Department of Justice and additionally reports to the Director of National Intelligence.
As a law enforcement agency, the FBI investigates an array of federal crimes, including public corruption, terrorism, cybercrime, civil rights violations, drug trafficking, sex trafficking, and white-collar crime. As a national security service, the FBI conducts counterintelligence to prevent espionage.
The FBI is led by a national director and is organized into the following functional branches: Intelligence Branch; National Security Branch; Criminal, Cyber, Response, and Services Branch; Science and Technology Branch; Information and Technology Branch; and the Human Resources Branch.
[Last updated in December of 2021 by the Wex Definitions Team]