The Army's intelligence chief discusses the service's new OSINT strategy
Sep 6, 2023
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Lt. Gen. Laura Potter, the Army's deputy chief of staff for intelligence, discusses the Army's new OSINT strategy and their goal to professionalize the OSINT workforce. Topics include the importance of OSINT in conflicts, the development of OSINT collection teams in the Army, coalescing work and training standards, and the challenges faced by the intelligence community in embracing OSINT.
The Army is prioritizing the professionalization of its OSINT workforce and using OSINT as the first-resort intelligence discipline.
The Army's OSINT strategy involves synchronizing efforts, modernizing training, enhancing real-time data analysis capabilities, and fostering collaboration with allies.
Deep dives
The Importance of Open Source Intelligence
Open source intelligence (OSINT) has become crucial in today's information environment. The vast majority of information is generated from publicly and commercially available sources. Lessons learned from Afghanistan and the Russia-Ukraine War have highlighted the value and importance of OSINT. The Army recognizes this and has developed a strategy that emphasizes OSINT as a first-resort intelligence discipline. The strategy aims to synchronize OSINT efforts, establish clear paths for training and development, and ensure compliance with legal and privacy considerations.
Army's OSINT Strategy and Lines of Effort
The Army has developed a comprehensive strategy for OSINT. This strategy sets a path forward, synchronizes OSINT efforts, and aligns with the Army's priorities of people, modernization, readiness, and allies/partners. The strategy includes specific lines of effort, such as developing a trained and professional OSINT collection force, modernizing training through live virtual platforms, enhancing capabilities for real-time data analysis, integrating OSINT into combat training center exercises, and fostering collaboration and intelligence sharing with allies and partners.
Guarding Against Abuses and Ensuring Oversight
Guardrails are in place to prevent misuse or abuse of OSINT information. The Army follows strict policies to ensure data privacy and compliance with laws and regulations. The Army does not hold or store data obtained through OSINT, but rather accesses it through software as a service agreements that ensure the data is clean and free of information on US persons. Auditing capabilities are employed to monitor OSINT collectors and any potential issues are promptly reported to Intel oversight for investigation. The Army also ensures the proper handling and cleaning of OSINT reporting before it is shared or posted.
Building an Effective OSINT Workforce
The Army is establishing a specialized OSINT workforce through training and development initiatives. Specific OSINT collection teams have been integrated into major Army formations, and positions are categorized with additional skill identifiers to identify trained OSINT collectors. The Army is also working on career development paths for intelligence civilians in the field of OSINT. The goal is to create a robust military and civilian OSINT force that is trained, aligned, and ready to contribute effectively to intelligence analysis and operations.
The Army is making a strong push into open source intelligence. Earlier this year, the Army published its first OSINT strategy. The service's goal is to "professionalize" its OSINT workforce and use OSINT as an intelligence discipline "of first resort," Lt. Gen. Laura Potter, the Army's deputy chief of staff for intelligence, tells me in this week's show. Also joining the show is Dennis Eger, the Army's senior open source intelligence advisor.