A division of Imperial Intelligence, the Bureau of Operations handles all covert operations beyond the scope of resources of the other divisions. It participates in surveillance and infiltration operations, counter- intelligence, and assassination missions.

Of all the bureaus of Imperial Intelligence, this is the one which is called the "Bureau"; no one in Imperial Intelligence for more than a few days would call it anything else. The Bureau handles the covert operations which are beyond the scope or require greater resources than those of the average system cell. The Bureau may send in a team of specialists to a sector, in effect creating an at-large system cell, or they may send a few agents to augment an existing system cell for a single mission.