Open source intelligence is freely available
Summary
- Espionage relies heavily on OSINT - open source intelligence that is freely available from news, social media and other free reources
Details
- Often it requires processing and analysis to be useful
Reflections
- Do research on publicly available information, especially before making financial decisions
References
Quotes
When people think of espionage and the intelligence products it yields, what often comes to mind are clandestine activities and top-secret reports. In the world of spy craft, intelligence is considered information you have to intercept, steal, or smuggle out of enemy territory. In reality, the majority of intelligence is generated from open-source information. Called OSINT, open-source intelligence is that which is freely and publicly available. It is not classified, and it is accessed by more than just government intelligence programs. Everything from newspaper articles and radio broadcasts to technical manuals and, these days, social media posts counts as open-source information. All OSINT that is gathered is processed and analyzed, and it forms the basis of many intelligence agency reports.
Related
- Information can be a distraction - Barack Obama
- Process information to make it useful
- Consume information from better sources
- Information technologies … modify how we act in the world; they also profoundly affect how we understand the world - Luciano Floridi
- Process information deeply by having a structured note system
- Wealth of information creates poverty of attention - Herbert Simon