Impact of Big Data Era on Open Source Intelligence

Open source intelligence has a long history. As a specialized intelligence, its earliest and large-scale application can be traced back to the intelligence work of the United States and Britain before World War II. The BBC Morning Service (BBCM) established by the United Kingdom in 1939 and the Foreign Broadcast Intelligence Service (FBIS) established by the United States in 1941 were the first agencies to carry out open source intelligence collection.

Over the past hundred years, personnel from many news media, research institutions, and social intelligence agencies have been engaged in the collection and analysis of various public information.

Although open source intelligence has a long history, the advent of the information age, especially the application and popularization of the Internet, as well as the development of information science and technology, have brought open source intelligence into a new stage. The rapid development of various mobile terminals and self-media has also brought about an explosive growth in the amount of information. The development of big data technology not only greatly expands the source of intelligence, but also deeply affects the information collection, information processing, analysis and judgment of open source intelligence.

In terms of information collection, big data can help us collect any information related to intelligence needs from massive amounts of data.

In terms of information processing, modern image processing, language translation and other technologies are used to clean, screen, compare, and classify the collected information.

In terms of analysis and judgment, intelligent algorithms and models can help us further discriminate the collected and processed information, discover its characteristics, and judge the relationship between massive amounts of information.