Establishing an Open Source Agency for Increasing Resources And
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Establishing an Open Source Agency for Increasing Resources and Expertise in Analysis of OSINT Information by Irena Stevens University of Georgia [email protected] Special Thanks to Dr. Loch Johnson ABSRACT As technology of information and communication continues to improve, Open Source intelligence (OSINT) is the fastest spreading and most abundant source of information. It is also the most underutilized form of information by intelligence operatives. The collection and processing of OSINT will become an insurmountable problem for the Intelligence Community (IC) without a venue for accessing the expertise of the academic, corporate, and research institutions on a need or demand basis. Since most of the information available to the analyst dealing with foreign events is open source, further development of an effective method of analysis can help fill in gaps and create links between information sources. Effective analysis of OSINT can move the IC toward a greater understanding of other countries, their cultures, and their leaders for creating more effective foreign and domestic policy. This framework provides coherence to a fragmented information database; individual agencies can supplement it with other forms of intelligence, such as those collected by clandestine or satellite methods, to be used for their specific purpose. Since the internet is the main source of the expanding supply of information, it can also be used to organize and funnel ideas between outside parties and the intelligence community through a database of personnel and relevant research. The willingness to process and share information is rewarded with a system of incentives designed to benefit the analyst through monetary, professional, intellectual, and psychological rewards. Establishing an independent Open Source Agency can dramatically improve the framework of fragmented intelligence by expert personnel and enable the intelligence community and other research institutions to gain mutual benefit in processing open source information through the sharing of ideas. ESSAY The Intelligence Community (IC) is composed of 16 agencies designed to collect, process, analyze, and disseminate information which provides timely and relevant intelligence for decision makers and reduces uncertainty in conflict. Some collection methods of intelligence are considered secret, classified, or closed information. These secret methods consist of HUMINT, clandestine espionage agents, SIGINT, signals intelligence, IMINT, photography and satellite intelligence, MASINT, energy emissions, and others. Other information is sensitive or confidential, but typically not secret. The majority of this information is OSINT, open source intelligence that can be legally obtained from public information sources such as newspapers, websites, and books. This type of information is different from classified intelligence obtained by the IC through clandestine operations. It is the most widespread source of information, and often the cheapest. However it continues to be an undervalued source of information compared to secret sources. The problems of meeting the intelligence needs of the 21st century include improving informational collection and processing, expanding the scope of analysis, and increasing communication within and outside of the agencies in the community. These problems are prevalent in the IC and can be greatly ameliorated by establishing an independent Open Source Agency under the Director of National Intelligence. Open Source intelligence (OSINT) is collected from publicly available information that can be lawfully obtained. There are generally 4 types of OSINT information. The first is widely available data from sources like newspapers, magazines, library records, books, community records, scientific journals, textbooks, broadcasts, videos, movies, documentaries, and user driven internet databases like forums, blogs, and message-boards. The second category includes targeted commercial data like annual budget reports, acquisitions, ongoing research, and business patterns. The private sector has been coming out with many innovative ways to analyze patters in the global economy with information sources like Factiva.com, which hosts articles for business news from around the world, as well as various scientific, engineering, agricultural, and other such purpose driven databases. The third source of open source information is within individual experts, who have the knowledge of sources harder to locate, like professional books and years of expertise within a certain area. The final source of information is called gray information, which is limited in availability either because few copies are distributed or access is constrained. (p. 65 (3)) Distinguishing between openly available open source information and secret information helps isolate gray information, which helps identify areas of interest for the Intelligence Community. Establishing an independent Open Source Agency under the Director of National Intelligence (DNI) will help increase processing of open source information by increasing communication within and outside of the Intelligence Community and expanding analysis of intelligence. Creating this agency will help reorganize the IC in a more efficient manner as open source information will be processed to provide contextual background for further investigation by supplementary sources. Its manner of function will help solve important problems facing the IC. Firstly, establishing an OSINT agency will place more importance on the exploration of open source information. Such a change in the culture of the Intelligence Community is necessary for it to adjust to the changing nature of information. Secondly, it allows the IC to build a stable venue to collect and process publicly available information while avoiding duplicate costs. Finally, it provides a communication framework for connecting information using open sources to present in comparison to secret information, effectively isolating information that is truly secret and helping to identify points of interest for the intelligence community. To clarify, this agency is not supposed to procure finished intelligence or replace other sources of information. Rather, its advantage is greatest when it is compared and supplemented with other sources of information to create an all-source complete intelligence product. Creating an independent Open Source Agency will help restore the original mission of the Central Intelligence Agency as it was founded after World War II. The 1949 Dulles report, which was the first major effort to evaluate and shape the community after its establishment following the National Security Act of 1947, stipulated: “The Central Intelligence Agency should not be merely another intelligence agency duplicating and rivaling the existing agencies of State, Army, Navy, and Air Force. It should not be a competitor of these agencies, but a contributor to them and should help to coordinate their intelligence activities. It must make maximum use of the resources of existing agencies; it must not duplicate their work but help to put an end to existing duplication by seeing to it that the best qualified agency in each phase of the intelligence field should assume and carry out its particular responsibility.” (p. 16 (10)) The Dulles Report intended for the responsibilities of the CIA to be separate from those of other agencies in order to maximize use of existing resources. However, the end of the Cold War, the beginning of new international security threats like terrorism, and the subsequent need to keep up with the growth of information, prompted efforts at reform of the Intelligence Community. Investigative bodies like the Aspin-Brown Commission, the 9/11 Commission, and the WMD Commission recommended making greater use of open sources to improve intelligence products. As a result, open source departments have proliferated throughout the agencies of IC. One Coast Guard report states that “although there are interim measures that may be taken to leverage existing technology and better exploit open sources, it is unlikely that the benefits of a robust OSINT program will be fully realized. Why? The absence of an overarching domestic OSINT program has effectively shifted the burden of developing and executing policy, strategy and tactics to this field level organization.” (p. 34 (28)) Currently, the main OSINT department is the Open Source Center (OSC) in the office of the Director of National Intelligence, headquartered at the CIA building in 2005. It was built upon the former department Foreign Broadcast Information Service (FBIS), which has existed since World War 2 to translate foreign broadcasts and documents. Its main priorities are to mine and sift for valuable open source information on a computer, maintain a collection of published online material, purchase information from commercial and academic databases, and process material from a large number of other agencies that produce controlled unclassified, or sensitive, reports. The Open Source Center has proven to be successful in conglomerating expertise across many spectra, in student training programs and in producing intelligence related content. Its services have expanded to a wider range of customers at all levels of the government. One operative stipulates: “All told, more than 98 percent of the center’s products are unclassified...The less than two percent that are classified usually are in response to classified requirements. Classification also