A private military company (PMC) is a private company providing armed combat or security services for financial gain. PMCs refer to their staff as "security contractors" or "private military contractors". Private military companies refer to their business generally as the "private military industry" or "The Circuit". The services and expertise offered by PMCs are typically similar to those of governmental security, military or police forces, most often on a smaller scale. While PMCs often provide services to train or supplement official armed forces in service of governments, they can also be employed by private companies to provide bodyguards for key staff or protection of company premises, especially in hostile territories. However, contractors who use offensive force in a war zone could be considered unlawful combatants, in reference to a concept outlined in the Geneva Conventions and explicitly specified by the 2006 American Military Commissions Act. There has been controversy over whether PMCs in active combat zones should be considered mercenaries. The services of private contractors are used around the world. P. W. Singer, author of Corporate Warriors: The Rise of the Privatized Military Industry, says "In geographic terms, it operates in over 50 different countries. It’s operated in every single continent but Antarctica." Singer states that in the 1990s there used to be 50 military personnel for every 1 contractor, and now the ratio is 10 to 1. He also points out that these contractors have a number of duties depending on whom they are hired by. In developing countries that have natural resources, such as oil refineries in Iraq, they are hired to guard the area. They are also hired to guard companies that contract services and reconstruction efforts such as General Electric. Apart from securing companies, they secure officials and government affiliates. Private military companies carry out many different missions and jobs. Some examples include close protection for the Afghan president Hamid Karzai and piloting reconnaissance airplanes and helicopters as a part of Plan Colombia. According to a study from 2003 the PMC industry was worth over $100 billion a year at that time. According to a 2008 study by the Office of the Director of National Intelligence, private contractors make up 29% of the workforce in the United States Intelligence Community and cost the equivalent of 49% of their personnel budgets In October 2007, the United Nations released a two-year study that reported, that although hired as "security guards", private contractors performed military duties. Many countries, including the United States and the United Kingdom, are not signatories to the 1989 United Nations Mercenary Convention banning the use of mercenaries. However, a spokesman for the American mission to the U.N. office in Geneva (UNOG) said that "Accusations that U.S. government-contracted security guards, of whatever nationality, are mercenaries is inaccurate." As Martha Lizabeth Phelps points out, the difficulty separating private from public troops means that legal proceedings against these violent non-state actors can be complicated. She claims contracted combatants carry the legitimacy of the state that hires these firms. There is currently no globally accepted norms or legal framework applied to these firms. The corporate nature of PMSCs (Private Military and Security Contractors) is a barrier to their accountability for violations of international law (Crow & John, 2017). No international court has jurisdiction over these corporations and there is no preexisting mechanism in place bound by international law to account and manage for PMSCs use of force. However, there are a few soft law instruments in which these corporations are held responsible to some degree of legal status. One favorable argument for PMSCs is that they have the skills and expertise necessary to deploy in a short times notice with the ability to provide for a wide range of services (Malamud, 2014). However, outsourcing does bring on the risk of a lack of transparency in the selection process of third party personnel. In addition, the UN is held responsible to ensure a clean human rights record and maintaining a gold standard for missions that entail the use of private contractors. Often, states do not have control over these operations. In many cases, there are doubts to as if the work of private contractors does or does not fall within the boundaries of Article 47 of the Protocol Additional to the Geneva Conventions of 1949, as well as relating to the Protections of International Armed Conflicts 1977 amongst others (Karska & Karski, 2014). Although, in 2012 the UN Department of Safety and security published a new policy in which oversees the use of armed private contractors. Planning is also underway at the United Nations to prepare a convention dealing with PMSCs. Establishing clear criteria is necessary to determine when it is permissible to use such companies and for what activities. Criteria such as transparent decision making procedures, solid vetting and screening measures, as well as standard operating procedures.

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