intelligence analysis, overcoming bias and learning

[davidbfpo]

Last month I attended this international conference in London, hosted by the intelligence and security Studies of Brunel University and the University of Mississippi, a rather unconventional mix was on offer:

...cross-disciplinary discussion about the value of learning from other fields to improve both the understanding and the practice of intelligence analysis.

Professionals in other fields—including medicine, the social and behavioural sciences, history and historiography, anthropology and other disciplines engaged in ethnographic research, econometric forecasting, and legal reasoning—also face many similar challenges to those that exist in intelligence analysis, including:

Difficulties acquiring information from a wide variety of sources
Vetting and evaluating the information that is acquired
Deriving understanding and meaning from that information
Impact of deadlines, editing, and other production processes on accuracy of analysis and assessment
Problems in dissemination and distribution to consumers or customers
Managing relationship between producer and consumer (role, responsibility, independence & objectivity)
Developing professional infrastructure (recruit, select, train, & develop personnel; code of ethics)
Overcoming impact of changing technology and alternative information distribution systems
How do practitioners in various non-intelligence fields overcome these kinds of challenges? How are their challenges similar to or different from those that exist in the intelligence arena? What can be learned from the comparison?

Most of the presentations are on:http://sas.olemiss.edu/bciss/materials.php

[SWJ Blog]

Fixing Intelligence Analysis: From Specialists to Experts

[SWJ Blog]

Bias and Perception: How if Affects Our Judgment in Decision Making and Analysis

[SWJ Blog]

Dangers of Ethnicity in Analysis

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[SWJ Blog]

Community Ecosystem Analysis

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[SWJ Blog]

Qualitative Analysis Concept in Support of Force 2025 and Beyond (F2025B) Maneuvers

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[SWJ Blog]

Using Target Audience Analysis to Aid Strategic Level Decisionmaking

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Strategic Studies Institute: Research and Analysis

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Center of Gravity Analysis "Down Under": The Australian Defence Force's New Approach

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Enabling Smart City Resilience Through Center of Gravity Analysis

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Advancing Intelligence Analysis for the Multi-Domain Battlefield

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[davidbfpo]

Odd timing for such an article after recent publicity over the mistakes made, but this is Germany. At a minimum it is a pointer to the assessment tool developed and in use. Here is a key phrase:

But it's no great skill to identify people who are highly violent...The skill is in categorizing the people who are not dangerous among the people defined as endangerers.

Link:http://www.dw.com/en/only-half-of-da...ce/a-41848406?

[davidbfpo]

There are just over seventy threads that have 'analysis' in the title; most a specific to a campaign or theme, whereas this one is concerned with intelligence analysis, overcoming bias and learning. Three threads have been merged here and the former phrase has become the title. All prompted by the next post.

[davidbfpo]

The CIA has released this book 'Psychology of Intelligence Analysis' by Richard Heuer, as a free PDF, spotted via Twitter:

Did you know that the CIA released a free PDF on how to analyze OSINT Well, it wasn't JUST for OSINT. It discusses bias and how to keep an open mind when performing analyses. Worth a download and read.

Amidst all the explanations this is the best:

Dick Heuer's writings make three fundamental points about the cognitive challenges intelligence analysts face:

• The mind is poorly "wired" to deal effectively with both inherent uncertainty (the natural fog surrounding complex, indeterminate intelligence issues) and induced uncertainty (the man-made fog fabricated by denial and deception operations).
• Even increased awareness of cognitive and other "unmotivated" biases, such as the tendency to see information confirming an already-held judgment more vividly than one sees "disconfirming" information, does little by itself to help analysts deal effectively with uncertainty.
• Tools and techniques that gear the analyst's mind to apply higher levels of critical thinking can substantially improve analysis on complex issues on which information is incomplete, ambiguous, and often deliberately distorted. Key examples of such intellectual devices include techniques for structuring information, challenging assumptions, and exploring alternative interpretations.

Link:https://www.cia.gov/library/center-f...gence-analysis

[SWJ Blog]

Understanding Culture Requires a New Approach to Its Analysis

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[AdamG]

In the spring of 1997, a 14-year-old’s school science fair project made a convincing argument to ban a dangerous chemical compound: dihydrogen monoxide, known as DHMO. Nathan Zohner, a junior high school student in Idaho, gave 50 of his fellow students a report called "Dihydrogen Monoxide: The Unrecognized Killer,” which accurately laid out the dangers of DHMO, convincing the majority of students to call for its ban. The experiment caused enough of a splash that it was picked up by The Washington Post

http://mentalfloss.com/article/50190...rogen-monoxide

[AdamG]

Straight out of a Hollywood script

Following misrepresentations by a white nationalist leader and coordinated efforts by internet trolls, numerous researchers and media outlets spread a seemingly false claim that the man charged with killing more than a dozen people at a Florida high school belonged to an extremist group.

Law enforcement agencies say they have no evidence so far to support this claim, and the rumor appears to have been perpetrated by white nationalist trolls themselves.

Money shot.

“[T]hey are so hungry for a story that they'll just believe anything as long as its corroborated by a few people and seems legit,” wrote the creator of one 4chan thread.

https://www.politico.com/story/2018/...415672?cid=apn

[AdamG]

Tangential technology due to inevitably intersect this topic.

Fake videos are on the rise. As they become more realistic, seeing shouldn't always be believing

With more time, Pinscreen, the Los Angeles start-up behind the technology, believes its renderings will become so accurate they will defy reality.
"You won't be able to tell," said Hao Li, a leading researcher on computer-generated video at USC who founded Pinscreen in 2015. "With further deep-learning advancements, especially on mobile devices, we'll be able to produce completely photoreal avatars in real time."

Now imagine a phony video of North Korean dictator Kim Jong Un announcing a missile strike. The White House would have mere minutes to determine whether the clip was genuine and whether it warranted a retaliatory strike.
What about video of a presidential candidate admitting to taking foreign cash? Even if the footage proved fake, the damage could prove irreversible.
In some corners of the internet, people are using open-source software to swap celebrities' faces into pornographic videos, a phenomenon called Deep Fakes.

Note: soft paywall
http://www.latimes.com/business/tech...219-story.html

[davidbfpo]

Cross-posted on the Israeli intelligence thread. Note this is a free, online book (222 pgs0 and not read here yet.

An offering from an ex-IDF officer via the ITIC and the recommendation is byMajor General Herzi Halevi, Chief of Defense Intelligence:

Itai Brun’s book deals with intelligence analysis – the process in which knowledge about the enemy and the environment is developed to serve decision-making in the fields of policy design, operational planning and force build up. Among other things, the book relates to the nature of intelligence analysis, the analysis methodology, the role of intelligence analysis in combat, and the impact of the information revolution on the analysis practice.

Having known him for many years, both as a commander and an intelligence officer, Itai’s skill at describing and explaining complex reality has always stood out. In his book, he provides up-to-date insight into the methodology and philosophy of intelligence analysis, an area hardly broached let alone written about. Brun presents his own experience and the best practices of the entire Israeli intelligence community, and he does so, as always, in a clear and concise manner.

Link:https://www.terrorism-info.org.il/en...matic-changes/