Open Source Intelligence (OSINT): merged thread

[Stan]

I learned a lot from a great friend over coffee just outside of the gates of Ft. Lewis. Until my eyes started drifting over to more interesting sights in the coffee shop.

Hi Bismark !
That's not too far fetched. Most of Humint today is little more than common sense and eyes open. DIAs course goes farther with lessons and experiences over the last 25 years. That "book" at AKO is much the same. The folks that put that together are former Army NCOs and Officers who once worked for DIA.

Regards, Stan

[Beowulf]

We used to joke that OSINT was just an excuse to surf the niprnet, check email, buy crap from amazon, etc.

We started to get reports that some bad guys in the area were going to meet with a reporter, and we were tracking that, trying to find out where and when.

We missed the meet, but got lots of reports about it after it happened. Sure enough a few days later an analyst from higher emails us some pics from Reuters showing a group of BG's meeting in a typical sit down. Weapons, unifroms ak's, commo etc. The main BG's had their faces covered but some did not.

OSINT, actually proved useful, and will continue to do so.

This is especially true considering the BG's effective use of IO, along with the "good" of getting their message, videos, etc out there they get increased exposure and may end up showing us something we need to know.

[bismark17]

It's amazing how much information can be lifted from social networking sites like myspace, facebook or just googling the target's email address. Obviously, these things are more relevant on the CONUS L.E. side.

[Stan]

Deception and bias are of particular concern. These sources may also convey one message in English for US or international consumption and a different non-English message for local or regional consumption. It is important to know the background of open sources and the purpose of the public information in order to distinguish objective, factual information from information that lacks merit, contains bias, or is part of an effort to deceive the reader.

Bill Mera has some good strong points on this. My experiences in Sub-Sahara and Estonia often led to confrontation at the embassy. Reporting variations were at times near opposite and worse, irreconcilable. Those with greater rank, simply jammed their version down the tube.

The FM is certainly better than some of the "100 dash Ones" from my days in the early 80's.