Posted on 10/31/2006 9:04:56 PM PST by Prost1
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The U.S. intelligence community on Tuesday unveiled its own secretive version of Wikipedia, saying the popular online encyclopedia format known for its openness is key to the future of American espionage.
The office of U.S. intelligence czar John Negroponte announced Intellipedia, which allows intelligence analysts and other officials to collaboratively add and edit content on the government's classified Intelink Web much like its more famous namesake on the World Wide Web.
A "top secret" Intellipedia system, currently available to the 16 agencies that make up the U.S. intelligence community, has grown to more than 28,000 pages and 3,600 registered users since its introduction on April 17. Less restrictive versions exist for "secret" and "sensitive but unclassified" material. The system is also available to the Transportation Security Administration and national laboratories.
Intellipedia is currently being used to assemble a major intelligence report, known as a national intelligence estimate, on Nigeria as well as the State Department's annual country reports on terrorism, officials said.
Some day it may also be the path intelligence officials take to produce the president's daily intelligence briefing....
(Excerpt) Read more at news.yahoo.com ...
It is only available within secure facilities on secure networks that do not connect to the outside world. Everytime a packet goes outside the local facility it is encrypted. We're not talking PPP or PKI here.
In addition, the data is probably encrypted on the storage media.
I'll wager that EVERY single change gets logged and attributed to some user.
Garde la Foi, mes amis! Nous nous sommes les sauveurs de la République! Maintenant et Toujours!
(Keep the Faith, my friends! We are the saviors of the Republic! Now and Forever!)
LonePalm, le Républicain du verre cassé (The Broken Glass Republican)
This illustrates a common misconception about the intelligence communities. Intelligence work is about "truth telling." Lying is for diplomats and politicians.
Intelligence people stake their careers and other people's lives on being right all the time. Are mistakes made, sure. You fix it and move on. People that make honest mistakes and can show why they came to a conclusion are not punished. People that are sloppy, lie, or make stuff up are fired and barred from the community.
There will most likely be some indicator of the source and a date with each entry.
This will be a gold mine.
Garde la Foi, mes amis! Nous nous sommes les sauveurs de la République! Maintenant et Toujours!
(Keep the Faith, my friends! We are the saviors of the Republic! Now and Forever!)
LonePalm, le Républicain du verre cassé (The Broken Glass Republican)
Good one! Integrate it with MySecretSpace.gov where annalists compete for largest friends lists and the most goofy photoshopped comments.
Really, I think Intellipedia’s a freaking outstanding way to collaborate. It’s timely, widely distributed, as open or compartmentalized as need be and provides an audit trail. But most important, it rewards contributors with publication (rather than their managers or offices), motivating accomplishment.
Elections next week...
The fact that it exists doesn't tell you what is in the system. Sometimes it is more advantageous to reveal the existance of a project than it is to keep the existance a secret.
Sometimes dummy projects are created and 'revealed' as part of Maskirovka or Operational Deception. One of the best examples of maskirovka was Field Marshall Montegomery 'building' a fake water line to the southern edge of his defensive line. The germans were able to estimate the completion date and thought that the attack would come sometime after that. Montie attacked at el Alamein just before the estimated completion date of the fake water line.
Garde la Foi, mes amis! Nous nous sommes les sauveurs de la République! Maintenant et Toujours!
(Keep the Faith, my friends! We are the saviors of the Republic! Now and Forever!)
LonePalm, le Républicain du verre cassé (The Broken Glass Republican)
THINK, man ...
The existence of it isn't TS, the content are. And you can be quite sure it's not accessible from the internet.
So the news (quite interesting, actually, and I'm glad to know) is that the various intel services have brought the 'wikipedia' concept into their private network as a means of information sharing. This is wise use of my taxpayer dollars.
if i recall correctly an interview on TV years ago with former Deputy Director of the CIA Admiral Bobby Ray Inman, he was pointing out that (i) a large percentage of the information needed in intellegence work is readily available from public sources, and (ii) one needs to be able to appreciate what one is reading.
A Ronald Reagan and a Jimmy Carter looking at the same information may perceive it differently. Also the value of information may be inversely proportional to how public it is. In terms of coordinating that which doesn't have to be kept absolutely confidential, this may be a good start and help connect the dots. I assume it will also help new hires get up to speed. But the fear of information being leaked would seem to put a damper on how sensative the information can be.
There may also be an element of needing to trade some sensative information for other sensative information, and just posting it out there for everyone, while it may be beneficial to the group, the person who invested a lot of themselves in achieving this insight might need some reward structure to come forward (considerations regarding job security, promotion and reputation if the corporate world is any example).
even with all the caveats, i would think it a good step, learning as they go.
You aint just whistling dixie. Clearances don't remain intact for untrustworthy types. Our politicians' questioning of intel these last few years have done more damage than they'll ever know.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.