Talk:Open Source Intelligence

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Contents 1 VALUE 2 Let's start fresh 3 Showing some promise 4 Here are two references, will not be spending any more time on this 5 "... not related to open-source software" 6 Introduction 7 External Links 8 Pathetic 9 Opening section is far too long

[edit] VALUE

This are might sound like an advert but it reflects current policy in the community, I think it should be unflagged. I am new to wiki but it seems that some users and administrators go pretty much over the edge on keeping this "commercial free" or "advert free" OSINT is one of the key facors in intelligence (and guess where wiki comes in on that picture... that was a sidenote...) and some of the proceedures may sound unacademic or like an advert... but this is what it is... so to those wikicleaners please relax a bit you have something great here but if you want non academic "real world" people that actually work in this business you will have to accept tha some of our contributions do not fully satisfy your standards. I just hope we can all live and benefit from one another... Thanks, Desertson 06:26, 18 April 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Let's start fresh

Going even further than David did, I am removing the entire old discussion. Let's start fresh, and everyone please be civil and behave in an adult, professional manner.--Jimbo Wales 17:16, 4 October 2006 (UTC)

Archived: here. Peter O. (Talk) 08:07, 15 October 2006 (UTC)

A good decision!

Open Source Intelligence under one name or another has been around for hundreds of years. The significance today of OSINT in the USA is the conflict between military, government and the private sector as to how the bulk of intelligence should be obtained. With the Internet, instant communications, and advanced media search the bulk of actionable and predictive intelligence can be obtained from public, unclassified sources. The major multi-billion dollar US Defense Contractors will soon have the monopoly on military and government OSINT, and are actively seeking to become the sources for countries across Europe, the Middle East and Asia. Government Agencies have been slow to embrace OSINT, or believe they already have suitable information feeds from the media, academia and public records. With much fanfare, news releases and statements the US Government has yet to fund any comprehensive movement to an Open Source model.

In the private sector Competitive Intelligence, focused and directed to specific industries still has opportunities for small and medium businesses to compete in niche markets, but that too is being consolidated by the major information providers. In the media OSINT is considered as nothing new, the everyday operation of a traditional newsroom. Investigative Journalists use searches, databases, primary interviews, sources, and leaks to write every feature.

Accredited Journalists have some protection in asking questions, and researching for recognized media outlets. Even so they are imprisoned, even executed for searching out what we know as OSINT. Private individuals remember --- Collecting data for foreign military, known military agents or subcontractors is espionage in most countries. - Alan Simpson, Washington, DC.

[edit] Showing some promise

This is showing some promise, but it is still a mess. Am delighted to see Jimbo Wales take an interest.

If someone wants to use www.oss.net/BASIC and www.oss.net/LIBRARY to actually figure out what has been best of the best the last eighteen years, I would be glad to help them (I understand I just cannot hire anyone. I do not, however, wish to deal with self-promoting vendors who are recent arrivals on the scene and now seek to claim a history they simply do not have. The above statement about US defense contractors having a monopoly is flat out wrong. I suggest that both Simpson and I and the CIA person be banned from posting to this article page (but welcome on this discussion page), and we let Wikipedia magic play itself out.

There are two trends, both promising:

1) We all seem to be converging on the need for universal free access to all information in all languages all the time. That includes the end of copyright as it has been manipulated by Disney and others--at a minimum, semantic web on top of Google breaks the copyright link which also opening up the possibility of getting structured footnotes for micro-cash. Hand-held devices (I could have given every one of the five billion poor a cell phone for the cost to date of the Iraq war) will be reach-back tools for both "teach me how" mentoring on demand, and "just enough, just in time" tailored public intelligence.

2) There is indeed a race between Wall Street and its European-based "gnomes" and the Collective Intelligence of We the People. I am absolutely committed to seeing Google.org merge with Serious Games and WikiCalc so that we can do "second life" scenario depictions and issue red-yellow-green scorecards for local, state, national, and global budgets (what I call reality-based budgeting, and the Comptroller General David Walker calls budgeting for the future). Despite attempts to use Web 2.0 to censor and control, I believe the cat is out of the bag and the people will ultimately prevail.

I have posted the program for IOP '07, everything can be viewed at www.oss.net/IOP. I invited Jimbo to speak but evidently his staff did not see fit to respond. I will gladly provide 6 scholarship seats to anyone recommended by the Wikipedia Foundation, and I would like very much to feature Wikipedia and new troll-free options at IOP '08.

Best wishes, Robert David Steele

The article needs help but biased editing is not helpful. Biased resources are questionable and often a waste of time. I saw your changes to this article and can't say your judgement as to what it needs was useful. Self-promting yes. Useful - not much, but a little. Try suggesting a SOURCED paragraph to add to the article that is not self promoting and maybe it'll be added (You do know sources that are not at your website, right?). WAS 4.250 17:52, 27 October 2006 (UTC)

This comment is understandable but remarkably ignorant. Are you unaware of the fact that my website is the library for the 25,000 pratitioners represented by 7,500 participants in the international conference, who came to hear the wisdom of 600 international experts other than myself as the host and moderator? Sorry, but your system is simply too cranky and disrespectful of collected knowledge. I note that the top of the article now has a complaint about the article not being international enough. Let me explain that clearly: I pointed the entire world to this article and asked them to add their international contributions, after I spent no less than two days fixing it up only to see it trashed by Alan Simpson and some fool from the Foreign Broadcast Information Service. At that point, the international community wrote Wikipedia off as a place for anything other than incidental secondary knowledge. Sorry 'about that--we tried, we all lose.~~ —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Robert Steele (talk • contribs) 13:23, 4 April 2007 (UTC).

[edit] Here are two references, will not be spending any more time on this

I've been working this for eighteen years. www.oss.net/BASIC is a one page guide to the most important hot links, including the important work of others such as Joe Markowitz and General Al Gray. www.oss.net/LIBRARY is a searchable sortable work table to the entire collection, which includes contributions from over 600 world class people including the Director General of the Red Cross. If you think that pointing to the work of 600 others that I have been carefully archiving is self-promoting, then I really don't want your attention.

I'm going to give up on this page. It is what it is. Yes, First Monday had a fine article. Just about everything else is plagarism, mis-representation, or well-intentioned copy-catting (the East European OSINT pages, for example).

I respect Wikipedia as an idea, and I especially respect the fact that Jimbo took the time (as I took the time to visit Wikimania, something I plan to do annually), but the bottom line is that I have pointed all of you to eighteen years of work by the real pioneers (see the OSINT Honors at www.oss.net for the complete list) and somehow that does not seem to compute. I'm the hub, not the wheel, and frankly, I don't give a damn if anyone considers me self-promoting, that is so far off the mark as to be sad.

With best wishes, Robert David Steele

[edit] "... not related to open-source software"

I know that people have bigger fish to fry here, but this phrase in the opening paragraph bothers me.

First, OSINT was a major factor in the name esr and Bruce Perens chose for their post-free-software movement. The initial announcement (preserved at [1]) ends with this paragraph:

Yes, we're aware of the specialized meaning "open source" has in the intelligence community. This is a feature, not a bug.

Second, the article discusses competitive intelligence as well as national intelligence, and clearly, in industries where it makes a difference, open source code is one of the open sources you look at. If Microsoft wants to know where Sun is heading, they study Sun's investor reports, government filings, and press releases... and the source code to Java and Solaris.

I know what this phrase is trying to say--that OSINT isn't named after, nor are its practices significantly inspired by, OSS--and why it's there--because otherwise, many people would incorrectly assume that OSINT 'was' named after or patterned after OSS. But to say that OSINT and OSS aren't related at all, that the similar names are just a coincidence, isn't really true. There has to be a more precise way to get the across, but I can't think of it right now. --75.36.131.149 11:38, 14 September 2007 (UTC)

I think the point is that OSINT is not related to Open source Software, but the proponents of Open source Software appear to see a derivation. It's very much one way traffic.

Frankly OSS is just another available source for an OSINT analyst.

ALR 11:57, 14 September 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Introduction

Based on the general principle that you should not use a term to define itself, I changed this...

Open Source Intelligence (OSINT) is an information processing discipline that involves finding, selecting, and acquiring information from open sources and analyzing it to produce actionable intelligence.

to this...

Open Source Intelligence (OSINT) is an information processing discipline that involves finding, selecting, and acquiring information from publicly available sources and analyzing it to produce actionable intelligence. --Axiomatica 19:59, 18 September 2007 (UTC)

[edit] External Links

Deleted these broken links:

From Advocacy and analysis of OSINT http://www.isanet.org/noarchive/hulnick2.html Expanding Open Source Intelligence: Is There a Downside?

From News and Commentary http://www.washingtontimes.com/national/20060420-114257-9897r_page2.htm Washington Times - Inside the Ring: Secrecy culture - 21 April 2006 --Axiomatica 21:04, 18 September 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Pathetic

am truly dismayed that this community has seen fit to completely purge OSS.Net and the seminal works of over 650 international authorities. This is childish, unprofessional, and very sad. Robert Steele, not interested in logging in.

[edit] Opening section is far too long

template seems to have changed though. ninety:one 19:56, 31 May 2008 (UTC)