NATIONAL INFORMATION STRATEGY:
CENDI & COSPO AS CATALYSTS
FOR NATIONAL SECURITY AND NATIONAL COMPETITIVENESS
Introduction Open Source Roots–Copeland Anecdote Informing the Consumer or Collecting Secrets? 90% of Consumer's Input Unclassified & Unanalyzed (Congress, White House, Bureaucracy, Foreign Governments, Lobbyists, Think Tanks, Media, Friends–<10% Intelligence) 40-80% of Producer's Input from Open Sources–Allen Dulles New Threats/Environments Lend Themselves to OSINT Coverage Jig-Saw Puzzle Analogy–OSINT and Other Means Opportunity for Savings in Every Government Department PATHFINDER at the Dawn of the 21st Century
The Open Source Environment Information Continuum (Nine Sectors) Schools, Universities, Businesses, Private Investigators & Information Brokers, Media, Government, Defense, Intelligence Information Matrix (Five Columns) Political-Legal, Socio-Economic, Ideo-Cultural, Techno-Demographic, Natural-Geographic Distributed versus Central Intelligence (90-10) Electronic versus Hard Copy Intelligence (10-90) Internet is 10% of cyberspace, cyberspace 10% of knowledge We constantly forget the value and the difficulty of hard copy CENDI/COSPO Good Start–Now to FRD, USG Information Assets Vice President: Must Harness the Distributed Intelligence of the Nation OSINT in the 21st Century: the Mesh and the Net Overview of Some National Open Source Intelligence Practices Australia–Pacific Rim Tier 4 burden-sharing option Canada–80% from open sources, unclassified production France–economic intelligence Germany–still a sweat-shop, creeping forward Israel–precision-strike, U.S. information brokers, FOIA masters Italy–you can just imagine… Japan–6,000 newsprint pages a day collected, private sector lead Netherlands–reorganization of collection, analysis; Internet centralized discovery, decentralized exploitation; possible lead for European OSINT Council Quebec–harbinger of future provincial/state endeavors Singapore–National Computer Board, wiring the island Sweden–triad Committee, S&T attaches, Internet, “smart Nation” United Kingdom–C4I (I=Info), DIS, Foreign Office, Board of Trade
Some Generalizations About OSINT Practices in Other Governments No one has a national information strategy No one has a significant lead on U.S. Government-industry relationships are all terribly ineffective Private sector collection, translation, & analysis capabilities not used Bureaucracy and control of money are the show-stoppers Amount of money spent on OSINT by government is marginal Virtually nothing is spent on technical applications: focus on content Consumers do their own OSINT, Producers do not filter/evaluate
ACCESS: Intelligence in the Age of Information Data, Information, Intelligence: Emphasis on OSINT Achieves Savings, Satisfies Broader Range of Requirements Enables Clandestine and Technical Focus on Hard Targets Secrecy Paradigm is Counterproductive–Quick Open Access is Key Information = Content + Context + Time Obtain Information Before It is Classified Secret Security through Speed and Obscurity Distributed Collection and Filtering is Critical– Human Filtering, Leveraging External Overhead Essential Analyst as Manager of Network of Overt Sources Analyst as Manager of Private Sector Outsourcing Analyst as “Recruiter/Handler” of Consumers Vulnerabilities in Both Government and Industry Data Integrity, Availability, Security Cost of Uninformed Decisions
National Information Strategy National IQ: Intelligence, Innovation, Integration OSINT is Vision for Harnessing Virtual Intelligence Community Four Elements of a National Information Strategy Connectivity–Global, National, Organizational Content–Distributed Centers of Excellence, Analyst Discretion Coordination of Research & Development–Common Toolkits Communications & Computing Security–Standards, Testing
Conclusions Cannot Reinvent National Intelligence in a Vacuum Need an Investment Strategy for Government and Corporate OSINT National Information Strategy is Means to Achieve End Must Engage Office of Management and Budget CENDI/COSPO As Foundation for National Information Foundation International OSINT Burden-Sharing, International OSINT Council
References
OSS NOTICES (ISSN 1078-1935), a monthly 24-page newsletter on open sources, systems, and services pertinent to intelligence production.
National Security & National Competitiveness: Open Source Solutions (Proceedings, Volumes I and II, respectively for each year 1992-1994)
“Open Source Intelligence: What Is It? Why Is It Important to the Military?”, White Paper, February 1995
Open Source Intelligence Resources for the Military Intelligence Officer, prepared by the 434th Military Intelligence Detachment (Strategic) of the U.S. Army, November 1994
“Private Enterprise Intelligence: Its Potential Contribution to National Security”, invited paper for the Canadian Intelligence Community Conference on “Intelligence Analysis and Assessment”, 29 October 1994
“ACCESS: Theory and Practice of Intelligence in the Age of Information”, Special Report, 26 October 1993
Collected OSINT articles and back issues of OSS NOTICES in ASCII, available free at <oss.net> via gopher, wais, or ftp
* CENDI: Commerce, Energy, NIH/NASA, Defense, Intelligence Working Group;COSPO: Community Open Source Program Office
