CIA mines 'rich' content from blogs

[TexasLawyer]

CIA mines 'rich' content from blogs

By Bill Gertz
THE WASHINGTON TIMES
April 19, 2006

President Bush and U.S. policy-makers are receiving more intelligence from open sources such as Internet blogs and foreign newspapers than they previously did, senior intelligence officials said. The new Open Source Center (OSC) at CIA headquarters recently stepped up data collection and analysis based on bloggers worldwide and is developing new methods to gauge the reliability of the content, said OSC Director Douglas J. Naquin.

"A lot of blogs now have become very big on the Internet, and we're getting a lot of rich information on blogs that are telling us a lot about social perspectives and everything from what the general feeling is to ... people putting information on there that doesn't exist anywhere else," Mr. Naquin told The Washington Times.

Eliot A. Jardines, assistant deputy director of national intelligence for open source, said the amount of unclassified intelligence reaching Mr. Bush and senior policy-makers has increased as a result of the center's creation in November.

<snip>

Mr. Naquin said recent OSC successes have included the discovery of a technology advance in a foreign country. Also, most data on avian flu outbreaks come from open sources, he said. "Have we got coups out of it? Close to it," Mr. Naquin said. "But certainly we've had more insight than we've ever had before." The OSC uses powerful computers and software technology to "sift" the Internet for valuable intelligence. It also buys information from commercial databases.

<snip>

http://www.washtimes.com/national/20060418-110124-3694r.htm

[merwin]

1. The CIA cares about social perspectives?

I thought they were supposed to go after the terrorists...

[Cessna Invesco Palin]

5. Sure they do.

Seriously, the CIA cares about literally everything. Just look at the astonishing amount of unclassified information they put out every year.

[saigon68]

6. No with Negroponte They like to KILL NUNS

And have anal sex with screaming 15 year old male victims (read the Taguba Report)

[OKthatsIT]

42. or slaughter entire villages...just because

[rodeodance]

7. I find this paragraph very very scary.

...."A lot of blogs now have become very big on the Internet, and we're getting a lot of rich information on blogs that are telling us a lot about social perspectives and everything from what the general feeling is to ... people putting information on there that doesn't exist anywhere else," Mr. Naquin told The Washington Times.

[smacky44]

32. Ah, governing by blogs.... So when they say "polls don't matter"

it all depends on what the word "poll" means.

Damn, why are we paying all those high salaries to administration appointees if all they need is a couple of people scoping out blogs to establish policies?

[Supersedeas]

34. has Social Control become one of their objectives?

[sutz12]

35. re: has Social Control become one of their objectives?

Wasn't it always?

[lapfog_1]

2. Think of the movie "3 days of the Condor"

and think of the little CIA analysis office that Robert Redford's character worked in, multiply by a *lot* and bring it forward 30 years. There are a number of other very scary parallels with that movie as well!

[Zorra]

3. Dear CIA: I have some absolutely reliable information for you....

George Bu*h and his administration are total fuckhead traitors (but dang, you spooks already know this better than we do, don't you?)

Y'all know how rotten they really are - so be real patriots - and go public with all the dirt that you have on these treasonous, un-American, anti-democratic bastards.

Allegiance to the American people supercedes allegiance to someone you all know to be a corrupt Commander-in-Chief.

[cyr330]

4. It's clear; they're going to arrest all of us here @ DU!

[shadowknows69]

11. Oh eventually

I think we can bank on it.

[formercia]

31. At least I won't go without having my say.

but trying to insult someone without a sese of shame is challenging.:evilgrin:

[Tight_rope]

36. Yeah...I been waiting on them to pay me a visit.

They will arrest me and charge me with social interaction on a blogger!

[Clovis Sangrail]

40. not all

only the most vocal

[rodeodance]

8. anything and everything can be mined for anything and everything.

..... "But now our customer base literally ranges from the president to local police departments," Mr. Naquin said. The Fairfax County police use OSC products, as do police departments in San Diego, New York and Baltimore. The center also provides support to the U.S. military.
A Defense Department official said Chinese military bloggers have become a valuable source of intelligence on Beijing's secret military buildup. For example, China built its first Yuan-class attack submarine at an underground factory that was unknown to U.S. intelligence until a photo of the submarine appeared on the Internet in 2004.
The center took over the CIA's Foreign Broadcast Information Service, known as FBIS, that was formed in 1941 to translate foreign broadcasts.

[TexasLawyer]

15. Right now there is probably an "Iranian Blogger"

who is giving VERY "credible" reports on Teheran's progress in the nuclear field, and the government's super-dooper secret plan to nuke NYC in a few weeks.

So now Rummy doesn't need to produce a live "Curve-ball"-type source in order to launch his wars of aggression. How terribly convenient.

[TheBaldyMan]

9. The Owl flies at midnight, the toast has been burnt

FODN MSOD LVPD QIDD FOVF
DIOG MISL BUDO PDFR YRVS

[Divernan]

13. Easier to joke when you're safe in the UK, kiddo.

"Auntie lost her mittens" back at you!

[TheBaldyMan]

17. Safe ? the CIA are foreign intelligence, they should be spying on the US

at all, that's the job of the FBI & HSA.

[Nomen Tuum]

10. Hey CIA, Here's a SECRET MESSAGE for Y'ALL

BUCK FUSH

before he

YUCKS FOU!

[Demeter]

12. But Can the CIA Learn From What They Amass?

Can Reason overcome the ingrained spook paranoia? Or will they take this information and distort it into propaganda, or worse, fog it up with the typical GOP perversion of the English language?

I'm all for Knowledge and the pursuit of Knowledge--I have a reall hard time with the destruction, perversion and abuse of Knowledge. It is the intent that must be clarified and tightly controlled.

[Uncle Joe]

29. I totally agree Demeter, it is a power that can be used for good or evil,

depending on whose in the White House and the Director of the CIA at the time. Currently on both counts, I think we are in trouble.

[alcibiades_mystery]

14. I'm scared to see their file on Kaloogian!

:rofl:

[file83]

22. OMG - you are right - the CIA would be totally MISINFORMED!!!! LOL...

:rofl:

[H3Dakota]

16. Hmmm

That is interesting, considering that information found in blogs is always so truthful & factual...

:eyes:

I can see the value of getting a measure of social perspectives, but relying on the Internet for intelligence? A bit on the scary side, if you ask me.

[ContraBass Black]

18. Don't we have spies and surveillance equipment for that sort of thing?

This isn't reassuring.

[KurtNYC]

19. This was an interview with a guy who works in this project

so of course he is going to say it is all of value and great and has "powerful computers" and whatnot. They started this in November and it would seem to duplicate things done elsewhere (the NSA) so it looks like he is trying to justify the expense. I don't see anything new there.

[Roland99]

20. Gotta take Gertz with more than a grain of salt...say, an entire salt mine

[BiggJawn]

21. So are they learning new swear-words from mine?

Dumbasses.

[file83]

23. If blogs are good enough for me, then why not the CIA?

You see Dad, I told you blogging was informative!!!!!

[warrens]

24. They just noticed some people don't like us

Um, Mr. Pretzeldent, there are some people out there who evidently don't admire and respect your every word.

[leveymg]

25. They're watching us watching them watching us . . .

It's an endless feedback loop. The irony of the whole thing is that we know just about as much (and as little) about them as they do about us.

There's a balance of error on the Web. Nice to see the CIA admit that the President's Daily Brief (PDB) is just about as informative as reading DU's Latest Breaking News.

But, I suspect, we're having more fun watching them. Welcome to DU, Dubya. :P

[0rganism]

26. "Rich content" -- HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA

I can see it now.

(Scene opens in a meeting room, west wing of the Whitehouse, it is morning, Bush is conferring with his OSC director)

Bush: So, heheh, whatcha got for me today, Nacky?
Naquin: Why, lots of stuff sir, just have a look at this.
(hands a large folder overflowing with printed web pages to Bush)
Bush: Yeah, we wouldn't want to miss anythin' importahntay, ya know.
Naquin: No sir, not at all.
Bush: Like "Bin Laden dahtermined to strike within US", that would have been nice to have at the time.
Naquin: Well, as I was saying, we have some really RICH content here.
Bush: I can see that. Like this one here, it says I can get a no-interest cash advance loan really cheap!
Naquin: Why yes it does, and who knew that such bargains existed?
Bush: And look at this! There are litrally hundreds of deceased Nigerian millionaires, who only need a simple bank account number to transfer their inherahtance. This is suhm good stuff, Nacky. Ah had no ahdea Nigeria was so rich.
Naquin: That's exactly the kind of thing we're discovering, sir. This internet thing, it is truly an amazing clearinghouse of information.
Bush: Almost like a highway, ya know? I was thinking, maybe we can call it that in a speech, like we are on the information highway.
Naquin: And I'm just like the highway patrol! You know, looking at traffic, making sure it doesn't go to fast in the wrong directions.
Bush: You got that right! Show me some more.
Naquin: Well, take a look at this here. There's this link you can click for "Hot girl-on-girl action", what the heck does that mean? Could be a terrorist plot.
Bush: Wait -- those are my daughters in that picture! In a bathtub! I'm gonna have a talk with the twins when we're done here.
Naquin: Yes, we may be infiltrated deeper than we know.
Bush: Well, it's time to do some more fun drazers for mah party. Keep up tha good work, Nacky, you're doin' a heckuva job.

[Catrina]

33. *lol* ~ funny! I wonder if it occurred to them that the Chinese Military

bloggers might be posting 'FALSE' information in order to mislead them? :rofl:

Putting up a picture of a submarine is hardly something a Chinese military person would do especially considering the censorship of the Internet in China, unless he had permission to do so, imo.

[Tight_rope]

37. LMBAO....I love your true interpretation of the Chimps DWB!

[myrna minx]

39. LOL!

Too funny.

[bklyncowgirl]

27. Hi Agent Mike! Wow you made the Washington Times! nt

[Us vs Them]

28. This is the CIA trying to justify sitting around all day and reading blogs

"What do you mean get back to work, I AM working! I'm, you know, mining for rich content on the blogs!"

[hvn_nbr_2]

30. Yay, technology! They can track Quakers & grannies without even...

bothering to buy grey wig disguises and infiltrating.

[myrna minx]

38. Wow, the CIA has discovered that blogs are big on the internets.

Now...does the FBI have email yet? :crazy:

[savemefromdumbya]

41. The NSA will go on strike if the CIA is stealing its job?

you can just see it - no those are our blogs......no they're mine......