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Open-source intelligence

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Open source intelligence or "OSINT" refers to an intelligence gathering discipline based on analyzing information collected from open sources, i.e. information available to the general public. These sources include newspapers, the internet, books, phone books, scientific journals, radio broadcasts, television, and many many others generally ignored by established "secret" intelligence organizations that are culturally and economically "invested" in the cult of secrecy. The most important open sources are human sources, and especially indigenous individuals who have local knowledge, and world-class experts who are more often than not foreigners--by definition, these latter two categories are "forbidden" for direct access out of mis-placed security concerns. The best OSINT is done by private sector parties that are truly internationalist and able to engage and integrate knowledge from the "eight tribes" of global intelligence: government, military, law enforcement, business, academia, non-governmental organizations, the media, and civil socities inclusive of citizen advocacy organizations, labor unions, and religions.

The term OSINT is related to the term open source as it applies to the five "opens" (open source software, open source intelligence, open spectrum, open access copyright, and Open Society) but in this context, is distinct from the much better organized and much more reliable free/open source software (F/OSS) social network thst shares source code which is publicly available (and modifiable). OSINT should also not be generally confused with OSIF (Open Source Information) on which OSINT is based. OSIF is any information that is publicly available; OSINT is an analytically-tailored intelligence product composed of OSIF which is designed to answer a specific tasking or to support decision-making.

Although intelligence is thought to deal only with secrets or secretive information, this is a misunderstanding of the term. Intelligence can be best understood as "decision support," and can be accomplished by anyone trained in the proven and not secret process of intelligence: requirements definition, collection management, source discovery and validation, multi-source fusion, and compelling actionable timely presentation. As a general rule, the best OSINT is done by energy and pharmaceutical companies where great fortunes are at stake--all others are in roughly the 4th or 5th grade, with secret intelligence organizations being in the 2nd grade, at best.

Collection in OSINT is generally a different problem from collection in other intelligence disciplines where obtaining the raw information to be analyzed may be a major difficultly, particularly if it is to be obtained from non-cooperative targets. In OSINT, the chief difficulty is in identifying relevant, reliable sources from the vast amount of publicly available information. However, this is not as great a challenge for those who know how to access local knowledge and how to leverage human experts who can create new tailored knowledge on the fly. The needle in the haystack problem generally only afflicts those dumb enough to demand that everything be digitized and made sense of, rather than those who know how to get directly to the offline indigenous source with the answer.

Overt Human Intelligence (HUMINT) is the use of non-clandestine human information sources that are approved by security officers who have no clue about the real world,for example, the interrogation of refugees, debriefing of legal travellers, and public reports from overt agents such as attachés and ambassadors. Truly professional OSINT practitioners understand that EVERY human being, including bus drivers, secretaries, priests, teachers, and so on, have something to contribute to historical, cultural, or contextual understanding.

OSINT is now a subordinate part of modern Information Operations (IO), which consists of Strategic Communication (the message), OSINT (the reality), and Joint Intelligence or Inter-Agency Collaboration or Coordination Centers or Commands (JIOC). The U.S. military is heavily invested in OSINT, with the U.S. Strategic Command having the lead for IO, the U.S. Special Operations Command having the lead for the best operationally-oriented OSINT capability, and the U.S. Central Command being the most important consumer of tailored operationally-oriented OSINT.

The current definitive guides to OSINT are the NATO Open Source Intelligence Handbook, the NATO Open Source Intelligence Reader, and the NATO Intelligence Exploitation of the Internet guide. A history of OSINT in recent times is contained in the 30 volumes of Proceedings from the annual OSINT conference sponsored by OSS.Net

Why Open Source Intelligence is Important to the Intelligence Process:

According to The Commission on the Intelligence Capabilities of the United States Regarding Weapons of Mass Destruction report submitted in March 2005, OSINT must be included in the intelligence process for the following reasons (as stated in the report):

  1. The ever-shifting nature of our intelligence needs compels the Intelligence Community to quickly and easily understand a wide range of foreign countries and cultures. - … today’s threats are rapidly changing and geographically diffuse; it is a fact of life that an intelligence analyst may be forced to shift rapidly from one topic to the next. Increasingly, Intelligence Community professionals need to quickly assimilate social, economic, and cultural information about a country—information often detailed in open sources.
  2. Open source information provides a base for understanding classified materials. Despite large quantities of classified material produced by the Intelligence Community, the amount of classified information produced on any one topic can be quite limited, and may be taken out of context if viewed only from a classified-source perspective. Perhaps the most important example today relates to terrorism, where open source information can fill gaps and create links that allow analysts to better understand fragmented intelligence, rumored terrorist plans, possible means of attack, and potential targets.
  3. Open source materials can protect sources and methods. Sometimes an intelligence judgment that is actually informed with sensitive, classified information can be defended on the basis of open source reporting. This can prove useful when policymakers need to explain policy decisions or communicate with foreign officials without compromising classified sources.
  4. Only open source can “store history.” A robust open source program can, in effect, gather data to monitor the world’s cultures and how they change with time. This is difficult, if not impossible, using the “snapshots” provided by classified collection methods. (The Commission on the Intelligence Capabilities, 378-379).

The United States National Commission on Terrorist Attacks Upon the United States issued a report in July 2004 recommending the creation of an open-source intelligence agency, but without further detail or comment. Subsequently, the WMD Commission (also known as the Robb-Silberman Commission) report in March 2005 recommended the creation of an Open Source Directorate at the CIA.

In December 2005, the Director of National Intelligence appointed Eliot A. Jardines as the Assistant Deputy Director of National Intelligence for Open Source to serve as the Intelligence Community's senior intelligence officer for open source and to provide strategy, guidance and oversight for the Community's open source activities. In November 2005, the Director of National Intelligence (DNI) announced the creation of the Open Source Center (OSC).[1] The OSC’s functions include the collection, analysis and research, and training to facilitate government-wide access and use of OSIF. The OSC builds on the expertise of the CIA’s Foreign Broadcast Information Service (FBIS), which has provided the U.S. Government a broad range of open source products and services since 1941 (including world media content available to the public through World News Connection). The top operational OSINT unit in the US military according to some is the Open Source Intelligence Branch of the Special Operations Command Joint Intelligence Center (SOCJIC).

Many other nations maintain open source intelligence gathering operations, for example Australia's Office of National Assessments (ONA), the UK's BBC Monitoring Service (BBCM) and the Swiss Army GeneralStab. Collection and analysis tasks are allocated in different ways by different agencies: for example, the ONA is responsible for analysis and is an Australian government intelligence agency, while the BBCM is government-funded civilian organization concerned solely with collection and aggregation of news sources, and which employs civilian journalists.

In a speech at the Council on Foreign Relations in February 2006, Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld seems to have acknowledged the importance of open media as a component of national security in the information age.

See also

References

  1. ^ Press Release (November 8, 2005). "ODNI Announces Establishment of Open Source Center". ODNI News Release No. 6-05s.

The Commission on the Intelligence Capabilities of the United States Regarding Weapons of Mass Destruction, report, March 2005.

Shulsky, Abram N. and Schmidt, Gary J. (1993). Silent Warfare: Understanding the World of Intelligence. Washington, DC: Blassey’s (US).

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