Christopher D. Sessums :: Blog :: Lead, Follow, or Get Out of The Way: Social Operating Systems to Support Intelligence Gathering

Sunday's New York Times offers a real social networking gem.
The headline reads: Logged In and Sharing Gossip, er, Intelligence.

The article reveals that there is a new covert social operating system for spies and members of national intelligence agencies using the same types of features found on MySpace and Facebook. A-Space, which stands for Analyst Space, is where members can swap satellite photos of nuclear sites and missile bases, as well as blog about patterns, connections, insurgent activity.

A-Space joins the spook's version of Wikipedia known as Intellipedia where intel officers pool their collective knowledge for sharing and updating.

This begs a difficult question for many within the ego-centric intelligence community who are afraid of being scooped by colleagues and will lose credit for their diligence. Of course, these same critics fail (once again) to recognize how the hoarding of intelligence and critical information leads to national tragedies (e.g., the attacks on Sept. 11, 2001).

What the article unfortunately points out is that the U.S. spy families (e.g., CIA, FBI, NSA) are dysfunctional at best. That is, besides each agency employing different operational protocols, critical information often fails to reach or circulate among those within each agency who need it most.

The hope is that an A-Space will make sharing information easier, linking 100,000 employees in the same way middle schoolers around the globe are linked via MySpace.

A critic of technology, Amy Zegart, a public policy professor from UCLA, believes that the benefits of social networking are overemphasized, and that the "most important fusion takes place inside people's brains." This may be true, but how are we going to get the right information the right people? Zegart keenly argues, given that the intelligence surrounding 9/11 existed before the attacks, what difference will the Web make?

Perhaps it's not so much a technology issue as it is a cultural issue. If a spy culture is used to operating "in the dark," how will social networking opportunities emphasizing openness and transparency change the culture? Perhaps this could be just what these bumbling, secretive agencies need -- a better way to share knowledge and communicate. Of course, just because social operating systems aid communication, it is still a GIGO issue.

Similarly, many insiders fear that a technologic solution will make sensitive intelligence open to hacking, moles, turncoats, and a confusion between "expertise" and "opinion." (Where have I heard this argument before?) Given the current U.S. governments' track record with technology, there is much to fear. Can private enterprise offer more viable solutions? (Now I sound like a Republican -- what is going on?)

I feel like many members of the edublogging community have been proselytizing the values of technology in support of education in a similar vein. Perhaps once a large number of baby-boomer spooks retire, a path will be cleared and new ways of thinking about social networking, information/knowledge management, synthesis and assessment can occur more easily. I know it's not about how old you are, but I regularly confront a generation of educators still angry about technology because they chose to remain ignorant. So I inquire: What are our options?