Archived material Access restricted Article
Rantburg

Today's Front Page   View All of Wed 04/19/2006 View Tue 04/18/2006 View Mon 04/17/2006 View Sun 04/16/2006 View Sat 04/15/2006 View Fri 04/14/2006 View Thu 04/13/2006
1
2006-04-19 Home Front: WoT
CIA mines 'rich' content from Rantburg blogs
Archived material is restricted to Rantburg regulars and members. If you need access email fred.pruitt=at=gmail.com with your nick to be added to the members list. There is no charge to join Rantburg as a member.
Posted by Steve 2006-04-19 09:05|| E-Mail|| Front Page|| [11133 views since 2007-05-07]  Top

#1 Uh oh, prepare for another assault on Thugburg.
Posted by Whugum Chinenter1092 2006-04-19 11:41||   2006-04-19 11:41|| Front Page Top

#2 Does this mean I'm being monitored each time I come here? Damn, I'd better clean up my cache, erase my cookies and all... I hope they can't browse through my PC content, especially my "special folders" private stash, or else they must be pondering to send me emails asking me if I'm ashamed of myself or something...
Posted by anonymous5089 2006-04-19 12:14||   2006-04-19 12:14|| Front Page Top

#3 Well, I for one think the CIA is the FINEST LAW ENFORCEMENT AGENCY THE WORLD HAS EVER KNOWN.
Okay. I'm covered...
Posted by tu3031 2006-04-19 12:23||   2006-04-19 12:23|| Front Page Top

#4 Unfortunately, I doubt that they're finding Mendiola's rambling any more coherent...
Posted by Edward Yee 2006-04-19 12:30|| http://edwardyee.fanworks.net]">[http://edwardyee.fanworks.net]  2006-04-19 12:30|| Front Page Top

#5 tu3031, I disagree. A quarter of century ago, it was a fine, mean, nasty (to evil totalitarians), sumbitches agency. CIA was badmouthed (to put it mildly) left and left in the Eastern European press on a daily basis. At that time, living there, I became quite fond of it. In the late 70's, some form of transformation began... I am not sure what happened, but "CIA now" and "CIA then" are images in my mind that have very little in common.
Posted by twobyfour 2006-04-19 12:41||   2006-04-19 12:41|| Front Page Top

#6 If anybody's...ummmmmmmmmm... out there, twobyfour said that, not me. I for one think the CIA is the FINEST LAW ENFORCEMENT AGENCY THE WORLD HAS EVER KNOWN.

Posted by tu3031 2006-04-19 12:49||   2006-04-19 12:49|| Front Page Top

#7 every day I sneak into my neigbors house and post from his computer.
Posted by 2b 2006-04-19 13:05||   2006-04-19 13:05|| Front Page Top

#8 neighbor's
Posted by 2b 2006-04-19 13:05||   2006-04-19 13:05|| Front Page Top

#9 Mendiola works at the CIA. Your problem is to find out whether it's analysis or ops.
Posted by Unuting Grereque6424 2006-04-19 13:07||   2006-04-19 13:07|| Front Page Top

#10 JOe DCI 2007!
Posted by RD 2006-04-19 13:08||   2006-04-19 13:08|| Front Page Top

#11 None of this should be a suprise. Even before Able Danger there was the 1994 CALEA Wiretap Act. It specified that a random 1/3 of all voice traffic and all data traffic be "Y"ed to your local FBI office for optional analysis. There was no explaination if Data Traffic included Broadband but there is no doubt it included Dial Up.

This was a Clinton Era Act that set the stage for mining operations like Able Danger.

So even if they were not mining webpages they were mining access to them and therefore mining web pages (later blogs). (also IRC, e-mail, usenet, ftp, telnet....)

Oh and for cellular? CALEA demanded location info to within a few feet. That explains the overlay networks to support 911 location info. The phone company and via datamining the Government have the ability to know where you are within a few feet as you wander making that cell call. If its one of the random 1/3 of the voice calls or involves data they also know what you send and receive in the USA.
Outside the USA the NSA records everything.
The problem is that its a after the fact datamining nightmare. Too much info. So what these guys bring to the game is emphsis on richer sources where analysis of raw data has already taken place in the bloggers minds. Look at it as integrated data (in the math sense) then the capture by OSC as further selective integration.
(double integral products?)
Posted by 3dc 2006-04-19 13:31||   2006-04-19 13:31|| Front Page Top

#12 If the CIA knows where I am within a few feet, and they occasionally listen in to my cell phone calls, I would very much appreciate if they would break in from time to time to tell me where I am when (entirely too frequently) I find myself lost. One of the reasons I was attracted to that engineer of mine is that he always can tell me where I am. ;-)
Posted by trailing wife 2006-04-19 14:08||   2006-04-19 14:08|| Front Page Top

#13 JM is not CIA - he might be NSA tho. A human one time pad.
Posted by 6 2006-04-19 14:16||   2006-04-19 14:16|| Front Page Top

#14 I think it should read the RIAA.
Posted by SamAdamsky 2006-04-19 14:19||   2006-04-19 14:19|| Front Page Top

#15 Number six, I hate breaking it to you, but you're not funny. Work on it... although they say that who was not given from above, can't buy it in the pharmacy... perhaps with a bit of perseverance, you may, eventually, succeed in convincing people that you don't have a complete humorectomy.
Posted by twobyfour 2006-04-19 15:00||   2006-04-19 15:00|| Front Page Top

#16 No real surprise here. For quite a while, I thought the Burg was a US government funded project to explore the possibilities of open source analysis. I'm still not completely convinced it isn't.
Posted by phil_b">phil_b  2006-04-19 15:10|| http://autonomousoperation.blogspot.com/]">[http://autonomousoperation.blogspot.com/]  2006-04-19 15:10|| Front Page Top

#17 phil_b - Shush. ;)
Posted by Laurence of the Rats">Laurence of the Rats  2006-04-19 15:16||   2006-04-19 15:16|| Front Page Top

#18 ... the Burg was a US government funded project to explore the possibilities of open source analysis

We all should be so fortunate. If it were so our foreign policy and defense protocol might make a whole lot more sense.
Posted by Zenster 2006-04-19 15:26||   2006-04-19 15:26|| Front Page Top

#19 TW - after the fact data mining. Not live monitoring and analysis. That would require a wiretap request and make lots of demands on hardware and people. After the fact is robot programs data-mining.

Thing of it this way. Instead of a tape its recorded in a file somewhere. A program not that much different from one of GOOGLE's robot spiders comes by and quickly scans some random sections of the file for keywords. Then it gets indexed into a database. Another spider comes along and looks who your talked to. A third may look at where you were an map your moving path into the moving paths of others (maybe cars and criminal acts). This will make a interaction database. This can then be crossreferenced with say the keyword database to link what you were talking about with what you were near....

Note at this time you are a few days after the call and all that is being created is more databases of possibilites.

Now if something really bad happens you start backtracking through all these possibiilites to hope to find hints of the perps.
Posted by 3dc 2006-04-19 15:31||   2006-04-19 15:31|| Front Page Top

#20 Agreed Zenster. It is, at the moment, "dense protocol" rather than "defense protocol".
Posted by twobyfour 2006-04-19 15:31||   2006-04-19 15:31|| Front Page Top

#21 CIA is not a Law Enforcement Agency.

CIA is America's Team. All their games are played on someone else's home court, You rarely hear when they've had a winning season but you will sure hear of the defeats. The Coaching staff changes regularly and the rules of the game can change drastically when you least expect it.

CIA CIA CIA
Posted by DonM 2006-04-19 15:35||   2006-04-19 15:35|| Front Page Top

#22 Also, most data on avian flu outbreaks come from open sources, he said.

I used to be an active participant in the forum he refers to - Here

Incidentally, the plot of my next novel revolves around this scenario. I wrote this snippet of dialogue earlier today, which sums up my feeling about the site.

“Jay, there are a lot of posts at ??.com.”

“I know. That's why we need someone to sort the wheat from the chaff, and there's a veritable blizzard of chaff at that site.”
Posted by phil_b">phil_b  2006-04-19 16:07|| http://autonomousoperation.blogspot.com/]">[http://autonomousoperation.blogspot.com/]  2006-04-19 16:07|| Front Page Top

#23 
Posted by OldSpook 2006-04-19 16:47||   2006-04-19 16:47|| Front Page Top

#24 heh
Posted by OldSpook 2006-04-19 16:47||   2006-04-19 16:47|| Front Page Top

#25 Phil: so your next novel is a roman a' clef tell-all about Rantburg's Peyton Place-esque dark secrets?

I am so reading it!

:-)
Posted by Mike 2006-04-19 17:03||   2006-04-19 17:03|| Front Page Top

#26 I suggest you look at Data mining in the Manga Ghost In the Shell and the Amime by that name. That is where we are headed with inteligence gathering. Not in the way they do it but what they do and what they look at. Open Source Intel is a good way to get to secrets hidden in plain sight. Hunting down terrorists is what they do BTW.

This Agency know alot about my online doings. However it knows nothing about me because I have no information of interest to them. It's all about the searching and what it is looking for. The metric for measurment of real value is the quality of the product. From this PR we can see they represent it as useful to the customers. We can't be certain of that as being reality however. We can just hope it's true.
Posted by SPoD 2006-04-19 17:03|| http://sockpuppetofdoom.blogspot.com/]">[http://sockpuppetofdoom.blogspot.com/]  2006-04-19 17:03|| Front Page Top

#27 That's twice you've hurt my feelings 2x4. You ought to be ashamed.

But still.... have a cookie.

Posted by 6 2006-04-19 17:19||   2006-04-19 17:19|| Front Page Top

#28 PhilB,

Give me a name / author. I'm always looking for new books in anything remotely resembling spy, mystery, techno thriller genre. Makes great airplane fodder and I fly way too often.
Posted by AlanC">AlanC  2006-04-19 17:43||   2006-04-19 17:43|| Front Page Top

#29 6 is my man - he's got a list Ima hoping to make someday, 2X4. A stud you're NOT, a gentleman neither, and I question your parentage as well.... obviously a softwood, balsa perhaps?
Posted by Frank G">Frank G  2006-04-19 18:39||   2006-04-19 18:39|| Front Page Top

#30 ok 6 that was funny :)
Posted by djohn66 2006-04-19 18:51||   2006-04-19 18:51|| Front Page Top

#31 In the late 70's, some form of transformation began... I am not sure what happened, but "CIA now" and "CIA then" are images in my mind that have very little in common.

Church Commission. Carter Administration. Boomers promoted into management positions.

Basically, a perfect storm of anti-Americanism, treason, and incompetency.
Posted by Robert Crawford">Robert Crawford  2006-04-19 18:56|| http://www.kloognome.com/]">[http://www.kloognome.com/]  2006-04-19 18:56|| Front Page Top

#32 I'd be surprised (at least a little!) if the CIA wasn't using open sources. They have had "readers' for a long time. And like Yogi Berra said, "You can observe a lot just by watching."
Posted by SteveS 2006-04-19 20:04||   2006-04-19 20:04|| Front Page Top

#33 #9: Mendiola works at the CIA. Your problem is to find out whether it's analysis or ops.

Neither, he's in personnel recruiting.
Posted by Redneck Jim 2006-04-19 20:33||   2006-04-19 20:33|| Front Page Top

#34 djohn66, yea, he seems to be learning fast!
Carry on, 6... ;-)
Posted by twobyfour 2006-04-19 20:36||   2006-04-19 20:36|| Front Page Top

#35 LOL Redneck Jim, Darn! I think we have a winnah!
Posted by twobyfour 2006-04-19 20:37||   2006-04-19 20:37|| Front Page Top

#36 AlanC,

You read my first novel about military robots and terrorism in the Caucasus online here - Autonomous Operation

You can read my second novel about maritime piracy/terrorism here - Sea of Fire

Or buy a pdf or paperback copy here - Sea of Fire

I'd categorize both as geopolitical thrillers. I think Sea of Fire is a better novel, but both have the same main characters. So reading Autonomous Operation first gives you a better understanding of the characters.

Mike, I'm thinking of writing in a lightly disguised Rantburg as some of the plot revolves around people communicating through public forums like the Burg and the earlier link I posted. I might make JoeM's posts encrypted messages. ;-)
Posted by phil_b">phil_b  2006-04-19 21:09|| http://autonomousoperation.blogspot.com/]">[http://autonomousoperation.blogspot.com/]  2006-04-19 21:09|| Front Page Top

#37 I might make JoeM's posts encrypted messages.

ROFL. I'd call encryption a close second to 11A5S's AI evaluation. :)
Posted by Angaviter Clomoting6296 2006-04-19 21:19||   2006-04-19 21:19|| Front Page Top

#38 3dc, that random information is archived, then possibly data mined later for key words and connections would be very comforting if I were paranoid... or had something worth hiding. It is not hepful, however, if (when, darn it!) I don't know where I am, or how to get to where I'm trying to go. I s'pose I'll have to invest in one of those GPS thingies instead. ;-)

But I am glad they're paying attention to the good work of intelligent amateurs and retired pros. It changes the probabilities in the right directions.

6, I don't always understand your jokes, but many others here make comments completely beyond my ken (possibly what the literary types term "rough barracks humour" or perhaps "man talk"? Neither of which I am qualified for, I'm afraid...) So I just enjoy you anyway. Here, have a nice macaroon. :-)
Posted by trailing wife 2006-04-19 21:25||   2006-04-19 21:25|| Front Page Top

#39 3dc, TW, the big thing in data mining at the moment is realtime and quasi-realtime data mining with the intent of identifying illegal activities in progress or catch the perps immediately afterwards. Unfortunately it will be years before we hear about any successes this results in.

Businesses have been spending $billions to make their systems and data real time.
Posted by phil_b">phil_b  2006-04-19 22:24|| http://autonomousoperation.blogspot.com/]">[http://autonomousoperation.blogspot.com/]  2006-04-19 22:24|| Front Page Top

#40 It's going to take faster computers and data.
Posted by 3dc 2006-04-19 22:40||   2006-04-19 22:40|| Front Page Top

#41 LOL! 6r leaves 'em bobbing in spemble pee again!!

2x4, You wouldn't recognize funny if you were drowning in an ocean of......

..and what Frank said!
Posted by RD 2006-04-19 23:18||   2006-04-19 23:18|| Front Page Top

23:53 JosephMendiola
23:25 JosephMendiola
23:25 DMFD
23:21 DMFD
23:21 twobyfour
23:20 JosephMendiola
23:18 RD
23:11 Alaska Paul
22:58 JosephMendiola
22:54 Skidmark
22:54 Matt
22:49 IT Insider
22:49 SPoD
22:44 Alaska Paul
22:40 3dc
22:38 SPoD
22:33 SPoD
22:32 Frank G
22:31 3dc
22:30 SPoD
22:24 phil_b
22:23 JosephMendiola
22:08 Alaska Paul
22:05 Alaska Paul
Merry-Go-Blog










Paypal:
Google
Search WWW Search rantburg.com