Like many other Latin American nations, Brazil faces the challenge of having to overcome a long history of involvement by the military and their related intelligence arms in domestic politics.

Early on, ABIN was tainted by a wiretapping and influence peddling scandal that led to the agency being placed under the direct control of the President and the Institutional Security Cabinet rather than being responsible to the national Congress.

[2] In 2024, an investigation was launched after it emerged that the agency had carried out surveillance on prominent critics of former president Jair Bolsonaro when he was still in office, including three justices of the Supreme Federal Court and a speaker of the Chamber of Deputies (Brazil).

Among those alleged to have been involved were Bolsonaro's son Carlos, the then-head of ABIN Alexandre Ramagem, and his deputy Alessandro Moretti, who was dismissed along with four agency department heads by President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva.

The agency's motto is "Intelligence for the defense of society, of the democratic rule of Law and of national interests" (Portuguese: A Inteligência em defesa da sociedade, do Estado Democrático de Direito e dos interesses nacionais).