The Value of Open-source Intelligence

The Value of Open-source Intelligence

Espionage brings to mind intercepted messages, stolen documents, and secret reports. But intelligence analysts also use publicly available material: newspaper articles, radio broadcasts, technical manuals, and social media posts. Collecting and analyzing these sources produces open-source intelligence, or OSINT. Governments are among its users, alongside researchers, journalists, and businesses.

Intelligence can be defined, in the words of scholar H. Akin Ünver, as “the methodical collection of high-value information in a way that yields comparative advantage to decision makers.”[13] In the day-to-day world of intelligence, much of that high value comes from the analysis of open-source information. Even in the early days of information collection for intelligence purposes, leaders recognized the value of collecting and analyzing open-source information. In her book Information Hunters, Kathy Peiss states, “The early managers of the CIA believed that 80 percent of intelligence came from foreign publications, radio, and people with general knowledge, although they focused especially on monitoring communication and broadcasting.”[14]

Public information becomes useful intelligence through analysis. Comparing sources helps an analyst judge what a report means, how it fits with other evidence, and which details warrant further investigation. Akin Ünver argues, “Although an intelligence agency’s capacity is primarily measured by how well it can detect and transmit critical information, its ability to understand and contextualize what is important requires the foreknowledge of what is ‘out there’ and easily available.”[15]

Think of it this way: If a war suddenly broke out in Spendu and you had no idea where or what Spendu was (a country? an organization?), how would you be able to undertake the analysis for whether and how to respond? A lot of the information you would need would be publicly available on maps, in news reports, and in academic journals. Similarly, how do you know where to look for potential threats to your country if you don’t have a good sense of geopolitical issues? You can learn about those issues in unclassified, open-source products.

A public document can reveal things beyond its stated subject. Its choice of details, omissions, and intended audience can provide clues about the people or organization that produced it.

Analysis is required to turn open-source information into intelligence. Various sources need to be combined and processed according to organizing principles such as keywords or categories. That way, seemingly disparate content is juxtaposed to reveal trends or themes. During World War II, Peiss writes that

scientific periodicals, technical manuals, and industrial directories directly from Axis and occupied countries were studied closely for evidence of enemy troop strength and weaponry, and economic production. Even trivial items could prove meaningful. Society pages might reveal the location of a regiment, and gossip columns “provide clues to scandals which a secret agent would exploit.”[16]

Open-source analysis also informs assessments of foreign policy, propaganda, and possible responses to an adversary.

Open-source information can also provide insight on how your measures are working and the effect they’re having on your adversary. Peiss relates how music librarian Richard Hill “surveyed the newspaper Deutsche Allgemeine Zeitung, tracing patterns of concert reviews, the presence or absence of certain theaters in the news, last-minute changes in operas, and notices to ticket holders about refunds. From this information, he drew conclusions about the timing, location, and extent of bomb damage in Berlin during the initial phase of Allied air attacks.”[17] This is classic open-source analysis. It’s not about cancellations of arts performances in and of themselves, but what they represent—in this case, the success of Allied bombing.

Broad public sources can help analysts interpret more targeted intelligence and decide where to investigate next. Akin Ünver notes that open-source intelligence covers “the spectrum of events, actors and roles that determines strategic relativity (i.e., how to define a country’s interests in relation to ongoing events), as well as which assets to deploy to achieve them.”[18]

An analyst asks what a source reveals about an adversary, how that inference fits other evidence, and what remains uncertain. Simply collecting public material does not answer those questions.