[gojomo]

Look up 'agent'. Pull up uses of 'CIA agent' in discourse around the world. Both the logical composition of 'CIA' and 'agent', and some of the extant uses, will be of people generically working for (or alleged to be working for) the CIA regardless of their title or nationality or formal employment relationship.

Just the search ["CIA agent" Snowden] will turn up a variety of writers, foreign and domestic, who have described Snowden that way.

Searching for ["CIA agent" Waldheim] shows multiple sources (including the NYTimes) addressing the speculation that Kurt Waldheim, former president of Austria and Secretary-General of the UN, may have at some point been a "CIA agent". (The latest and most official evidence: he wasn't.)

Also check out the passage "Agent or Employee" in the 'Encyclopedia of the CIA':

http://books.google.com/books?id=1Jc9wBsImOIC&pg=PA6&lpg=PA6...

It pretty strongly confirms what I described: in common usage, 'agent' means anyone working for the CIA, but in some contexts it also applies to foreign nationals helping the CIA. (Apparently, in the CIA itself, 'agent' is specifically reserved for helpful foreign nationals. But internal bureaucratic distinctions can't override the plain meaning of 'agent' and global usage, to mean both that and more.)

[nicarus1984]

I was questioning the accuracy/legitimacy of your assumptions around what "[m]ost of the English-speaking world" think.

[gojomo]

I think the reasoning and references I've provided justify that claim pretty strongly, but I guess we'll have to wait for a linguistic poll to be sure!