Using Social Networking Sites and Tools for Intelligence-gathering

Introduction

In a recent interview to a publication recently, Julian Assange, Wikileaks editor-in-chief and main spokesperson, said that US intelligence and law-enforcement agencies have access to all information on all major social networks and many Internet-based companies.

“Facebook in particular is the most appalling spying machine that has ever been invented. Here we have the world’s most comprehensive database about people, their relationships, their names, their addresses, their locations and the communications with each other, their relatives, all sitting within the United States, all accessible to US intelligence. Facebook, Google, Yahoo – all these major US organizations have built-in interfaces for US intelligence.” (Assange, in an interview to Russia Today)

This brief looks at ways the Internet can be used to expand intelligence-gathering activities and finetune intelligence gathered.

Approaches to Intelligence-gathering

With the Internet, through various sites, serving as a virtual meeting and debating forum for 100s of millions of users; it has become a treasure-trove for information on individuals, either directly posted on indirectly referred to. Intelligence agencies have been quick to use this information to extend their intelligence-gathering network. There are a couple of approaches to leveraging the Internet for intelligence-gathering.

The Complex Delivery

Delivering on the propositions has been far more problematic, though; especially in public spaces, and more so in a country such as India, where public-space infrastructure is either developing or dilapidated. The issues can be categorized as functional and non-functional.

• Social Network Analysis:
  Social networking has been used as a method to track and locate suspects, since the days of scientifc police detective work: except that it has been a manual and painstaking activity. The first change was with the manual social network charts going digital, using a software tool called Social Network Analysis (SNA). SNA is a method of analysing social networks (the connections between a suspect and individuals in its relationship network) quantitatively and qualitatively, either through numerical or visual representation. The networks can consist of anything from families (immediate and extended); professional links (office colleagues or the suspect’s business-cards folder); membership on networking sites such as Facebook, LinkedIn, and Twitter; social circle; mobile phone records; and various others. SNA software is used in applications as diverse as market research, competition analysis, medical research, and social research, apart from law-enforcement and intelligence-gathering.
  There are open-source packages available (Gephi, igraph, NetworkX, SNAP), which require a fair amount of software development and data analysis; as well as commercial packages (i2 Analyst, Sentinel Visualiser, SilentRunner Sentinel) where all the user has to do is start entering data.

• Complementary Intelligence-gathering:
  The complementary intelligence approach to leveraging the Internet for intelligence-gathering uses hard data gained from Human Intelligence (HUMINT) and Data Intelligence (SIGINT, IMINT, MASINT) operations to search for on-line links to the various references in the acquired data. The data will be entered into the SNA software, and the resulting visual and numeric representations will be used as references for on-line searches.
  Typically, these searches will involve surfing the Internet and social networking sites for fresh connections and leads that will feed fresh information into the HUMINT/DataINT networks. This cycle of refinement of information and leads finally results in the achievement of the intelligence objective; as happened recently in the case of the tracking down of al-Qaeda leader, Osama Bin Laden.
•  Normative Social-Networking Sites Research:
  While using social networking sites (and SNA software), as complementary sources of information, is useful for tracking a known suspect (individual or organisation), it is of limited use in unearthing fresh or new sources of concern. Given the silo-style operational style of many insurgents or insurgent groups these days, it is imperative to identify potential sources of trouble before the trouble erupts.
  It is here that social networking sites provide the most valuable information: as long as the potential source of concern is not a loner who, since s/he does not have to communicate plans with anyone, is therefore less likely to have the need to use the Internet. Joining on-line discussion groups, fora dedicated to specific causes or ideologies, and befriending potential trouble-makers, are ways to identify incipient plots and terror-threats. Several of the sting operations (targeting potential terror threats) in the USA have come about as a result of the presence of law-enforcement agencies being present, incognito, at such sites.

Limitations of Social Networking Sites Intelligence-gathering

While leveraging social networking sites and tools can be a valuable boon to intelligence-gathering agencies, it should be noted that there are limitations to the information the sites can provide; apart from the fact that if the individual/organisation needs to be have some kind of on-line presence:

• Level of Communication:
  The quantum and quality of information available on-line, on a suspect individual/group, is as much as the that made available by the most communicative (either in terms of being unnecessarily talkative or being forced to use communications media) member of the group. In an extremely disciplined and carefully-communicative group, the possibility of gleaning valuable information from the Internet is likely to be low to very low.
• Internet Penetration:
  In countries with low computer usage and Internet penetration, digital trails are much more difficult to unearth. Unlike in the West, the overwhelming majority of Indians are not represented on the Internet, and that, in itself, reduces the efficacy of using social networking sites as repositories of secondary intelligence.
• Encryption/Steganography:
  Even if a individual/group is present and active on the Internet, the use of techniques such as encryption and steganography (even more difficult to detect), can mask the contents of the communications between members of the group.

Conclusion

In the final analysis, leveraging social networking sites and tools, for intelligence-gathering, should be seen as a support activity to the traditional HUMINT/DataINT sources of intelligence. Western governments are much farther down the road to using the Internet for intelligence-gathering, and it would be apt to end this brief with another quote from Julian Assange’s interview with Russia Today: Now, is it the case that Facebook is actually run by US intelligence? No, it’s not like that. It’s simply that US intelligence is able to bring to bear legal and political pressure on them. And it’s costly for them to hand out records one by one, so they have automated the process. Everyone should understand that when they add their friends to Facebook, they are doing free work for United States intelligence agencies in building this database for them.