Rise of Open-Source Intelligence Tests US Spies (wsj.com) 32
China outpaces efforts by U.S. intelligence agencies to harness power of publicly available data. From a report: As Russian troops surged toward Ukraine's border last fall, a small Western intelligence unit swung into action, tracking signs Moscow was preparing to invade. It drew up escape routes for its people and wrote twice-daily intelligence reports. The unit drafted and sent to its leaders an assessment on Feb. 16, 2022, that would be eerily prescient: Russia, it said, would likely invade Ukraine on Feb. 23, U.S. East Coast time. The intelligence shop had just eight analysts and used only publicly available information, not spy satellites and secret agents. It belonged to multinational chemicals company Dow, not to any government.
"I'm leading an intelligence center that accurately predicted the invasion of Ukraine without any access to sensitive sources," said John Robert, Dow's director of global intelligence and protection, whose unit helps the company manage business risk and employee safety. Supercharged by the Ukraine war, the rise of open-source intelligence, or OSINT, which comprises everything from commercial satellite imagery to social-media posts and purchasable databases, poses revolutionary challenges for the Central Intelligence Agency and its sister spy agencies, according to former senior officials who spent decades working in those agencies' classified spaces. Dow is just one of a fast-growing number of companies, nonprofit groups and countries transforming publicly available data into intelligence for strategic and economic advantage. China has the largest, most focused effort, while U.S. spy agencies, with deeply ingrained habits of operating in the shadows, have been slow to adapt to a world in which much of what is important isn't secret, according to dozens of officials and many studies.
"I'm leading an intelligence center that accurately predicted the invasion of Ukraine without any access to sensitive sources," said John Robert, Dow's director of global intelligence and protection, whose unit helps the company manage business risk and employee safety. Supercharged by the Ukraine war, the rise of open-source intelligence, or OSINT, which comprises everything from commercial satellite imagery to social-media posts and purchasable databases, poses revolutionary challenges for the Central Intelligence Agency and its sister spy agencies, according to former senior officials who spent decades working in those agencies' classified spaces. Dow is just one of a fast-growing number of companies, nonprofit groups and countries transforming publicly available data into intelligence for strategic and economic advantage. China has the largest, most focused effort, while U.S. spy agencies, with deeply ingrained habits of operating in the shadows, have been slow to adapt to a world in which much of what is important isn't secret, according to dozens of officials and many studies.
Different sources for different information... (Score:4, Interesting)
Hiding a massive mobilization is virtually impossible in this day and age. That doesn't mean that other information sources aren't necessary, it means that, for this particular datum, they are somewhat redundant (although, technically in the intel world, having multiple independent sources confirming the same bits of information is something that is ALWAYS smiled upon). We may have only needed OSINT to know that the invasion was happening, but I guarantee that the powers-that-be are desperate for good HUMINT on topics like "How long will Putin's cronies put up with this crap?".
Re:Different sources for different information... (Score:5, Funny)
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There was a time when all you had to do to know when the US was planning a military operation was to track pizza deliveries to the pentagon.
Or sending an unwanted visitor to a town near you
http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-ZLJM... [blogspot.com]
Re:Different sources for different information... (Score:4, Informative)
OSINT is great, but once you hit its limitations you really crave more data. As an example, I could get daily imagery for a particular point of interest easily, and it was quite helpful in establishing a baseline of what was going on. But, in order to get a level of detail to have a strategic advantage you are quickly looking for real-time or time-lapse data which gives you orders of magnitude more insight as to what is happening when, how quickly, and rates of change in speed.
Using Dow's analysis as an example, logical questions would be if Russia could sustain their attack, what the best ways to counter them were, and where they were weakest.
I know we are early in this winter, but if Russia can't break Ukraine this winter I can't see a path for them to be "victorious." Likewise, if Ukraine can't inflict pain on Russian supply chains within Russia I don't know how they can survive the war of attrition. I don't think OSINT is going to really be able to solve those problems.
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OSINT can help you maximize the value your resources, say satellite imaging, to get the most from the least. That is a value add.
And of course, I think, OSINT also might be able to help you divert resources from where they are not so essential, ruling out the unimportant or secondary.
And I assume, much to my fear they are NOT, that our IC isn't so busy chasing domestic political boogeymen and is also leveraging OSINT. It should not cost too much.
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I think a lot depends on how much support the Ukraine gets from the West. I assume it will get a lot of support, but there is some pressure to back off on that.
A corollary is how much support will Putin get from his allies. Is China Russia's ally? Or rival?
Another question is, would Putin ever play the nuclear card?
Finally, what are the chances Putin might be toppled from power within Russia?
There are probably people who have pretty good insight into these questions. The problem is, I don't know who th
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I won't proclaim to be an expert, but modern history says an invading force can cause a lot of pain for a long time, but are unlikely to achieve their strategic objectives. A corrolary is that the longer an invading force fights the more it strains the wills of their allies and citizens.
More Like *Dow* outpaces U.S. efforts (Score:4, Insightful)
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There's nothing here about China accomplishing jack shit. Or is that just how good they are?
Tick-Tock
China analysts agree with the boss (Score:2)
This is always an issue in the west. Remember Weapons of Mass Destruction? Or the vague Covid Origin briefs more recently? The intelligence offices are political animals, they produce the intelligence results they are asked to produce.
China must be much, much worse. No accountability, all yes men to the man above them, ultimately to Xi. I suspect that while there junior analysts may be excellent, by the time it gets filtered up it is mush.
And that is very dangerous. I suspect Xi hears that Taiwan wou
Poisoning the well (Score:5, Interesting)
everything from commercial satellite imagery to social-media posts and purchasable databases,
I think the big question for national security agencies will be how to corrupt these sources of open intelligence. Not just to obscure and divert away from their real plans, but also to feed misinformation about other states and what they look like doing.
Using this sort of data will rapidly become unreliable as agencies put out dummy / bogus information just as sources of FAKE NEWS abound.
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Using this sort of data will rapidly become unreliable as agencies put out dummy / bogus information just as sources of FAKE NEWS abound.
Heh. You say that like FAKE NEWS would be a change.
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It is actually interesting to see how effectively you can filter out misinformation, and the lengths that someone needs to go to to counter it. From looking at nominal efforts to obscure information, it only took about 10% more time for me to get to what I wanted to know; I can see it requiring 2-3x effort to make similar conclusions with a more active.
I guess the key to success for a misinformation campaign is just how many different types of source data you can corrupt or at least cast doubt on.
Not Surprising (Score:2)
Multinational corporations, by definition, have offices in multiple locations around the world. That allows for people in different locations to gather local information and share it with each other. That plus the easier access to analytics makes this type of intelligence gathering more available.
China's intel problem is reality (Score:3)
China's problem, when it comes to intelligence, is that they're not used to getting unfiltered data. For them, it's unclear how to weigh data since they tend to believe in the extremes (ie: authority or rumor).
Re: China's intel problem is reality (Score:2)
Ukraine is a terrible example (Score:3)
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No he didn't. He was only doing maneuvers on Russian soil. In fact, his spokesperson said the following [npr.org]:
"There are no plans or intentions to attack Ukraine." He went on to say, "There is no reason to fear some kind of escalatory scenario."
So who are you going to believe? The Russians who stated unequivocaly they had no intention of invading Ukraine, or the U.S. and NATO military with their satellite images of thousands of Russian troo
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Here the word "telegraph" means "signal", not "announce"
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They stockpiled large quantities of troops and equipment near the borders for weeks. That's not intentional telegraphing, it's just preparing for an invasion without trying to hide that you are preparing. I do remember critics saying that "Joe is exaggerating, and trying to stir things up". He proved right, Russia marched in.
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That's not intentional telegraphing
If it's intentional, it's not telegraphing [wikipedia.org], it's signaling. Adding words that people didn't use also doesn't make an argument valid, but since you don't even know what the word being used here means, if you made a valid argument it would have been by mistake.
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Re: Ukraine is a terrible example (Score:2)
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Putin telegraphed to everyone weeks in advance in no uncertain terms he was going to invade Ukraine. Perhaps they should use an example of predicting an event that wasn't publicly announced beforehand.
He did the same thing the previous year as well.
The pre-invasion consensus was that it was another bluff because the invasion force wasn't large enough and the Ukrainian military would put up a much tougher fight than 2014, though Ukraine would probably fall eventually it would be much nastier than Putin would be willing to bear.
As a prediction it wasn't terrible, the invasion force was too small though more importantly underestimated the Ukrainian military which is well on track to win.
The big miss was pre
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On the contrary, the US announced many days before the invasion that Russia was going to invade Ukraine, and warned Putin that there would be significant consequences for Russia. NATO and the US began bolstering European defenses at least a month before the invasion got underway, so it's not like it took anyone by surprise.
The Death Star plans are probably there also (Score:1)
"You mean 5 spies died to get info available in a 3 word Google search?"
Bellingcat and the BBC (Score:5, Informative)
The Bellingcat group does awesome open source intelligence on various topics. ...
Check them out, really impressive
BBC Africa also does some of that, such as verifying killing of protestors in Sudan, or killing of women and children by soldiers in the Cameroon [bbc.com], and another murder in the DR Congo (I think).
OSINT does not require government (Score:4, Informative)
https://www.bellingcat.com/tag... [bellingcat.com]
The best part is these are mostly just motivated volunteers. They operate completely apart from government, so no hidden agendas.
Did anyone ask ChatGPT? (Score:2)
Wut? (Score:2)
1) I'm pretty sure the NSA built a big, bad, controversial data center in the middle of Utah. I doubt that's being used to store TPS reports.
2) The article cites the director of NGA, which is basically the red-headed stepchild of the IC. Yes, open source satellite imagery might make them, specifically, irrelevant, (but probably won't, because they literally have better optics and a better idea about where to point those optics) but that hardly covers the bulk of intelligence operations.