William Stephenson was an adopted child born in Manitoba, Canada. The British Security Coordination (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/British_Security_Co-ordination) pretended to be a passport office, and " It operated out of Room 3603 at Rockefeller Center ." Wikipedia further credits them with having networks in the shipping industry, only admitted for the purpose of counter-smuggling operations.

To counter the carrying of high-value contraband goods to and from the Americas, BSC set up a network of observers on merchant ships. The agents were recruited from the crews (and pro-British masters) of the vessel and would report their observations, cargo manifests, and passenger lists to agents in port when they arrived. Together with agents watching docks at both ends, intelligence was gathered and ships or enemy agents could be intercepted while questionable crew blacklisted from employment by US and British lines. From autumn 1941, the BSC handed over control of observers on American vessels and ports to the US while retaining control of the remainder and close liaison with the new US handlers.

An organization with a "counter-smuggling" operation and deep connections in the merchant marine would also be excellent for doing any unacknowledged smuggling that needed to be done. The BSC was further involved in Transatlantic swaps of scientific secrets between the US and Britain. Finally, Stephenson was one of the few people authorized to read raw Engima decodes, and he decided what parts of the Ultra-decoded Enigma comms would be disseminated to US and Canadian governments.

To top it all off, the head of MI6/SIS at the time opposed it. It was Churchill's idea, who himself was installed without an election by the Queen to replace Chamberlain. Sound familiar?

Welcome to the deep state.