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US intel wants to automate analysis of online videos

June 18, 2010 by intelNews Leave a comment

IARPA logo

By IAN ALLEN | intelNews.org |
A new project funded by the US intelligence community’s research unit aims to automate the collection and analysis of videos from YouTube and other popular online platforms, with the intent of unearthing “valuable intelligence”. The program is called Automated Low-Level Analysis and Description of Diverse Intelligence Video (ALADDIN). It is directed by the Intelligence Advanced Research Projects Activity (IARPA), whose mission is to work under the Director of National Intelligence to create hi-tech applications for America’s intelligence agencies. Few people are aware of the existence of IARPA, which was quietly established in 2007, is based at the University of Maryland, and is staffed mostly by CIA personnel. The research body’s latest project apparently aims to equip the US intelligence community with the ability to scan “for the occurrence of specific events of interest” embedded in online video files, and then “rapidly and automatically produce a textual English-language recounting [and] describing the particular scene, actors, objects and activities involved”. Read more of this post

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US agencies still lack basic language skills, says new report

June 16, 2010 by intelNews 3 Comments

GAO report

By IAN ALLEN | intelNews.org |
A major US government audit into the performance of national security departments and agencies has once again criticized the substantial absence of skilled foreign-language speakers. According to the Government Accountability Office’s latest assessment (.pdf) of the US Department of Defense and the Department of State, not only has the availability of foreign language fluency not improved, but has actually deteriorated during the past few years. The situation is especially desperate in the State Department, says the report, where the percentage of “generalists and specialists in language-designated positions” who fail to meet essential language criteria increased from 29 percent in 2005 to 31 percent last year. Read more of this post

Filed under Expert news and commentary on intelligence, espionage, spies and spying Tagged with John H. Pendleton, languages, linguistics, News, United States, US Department of State, US DoD, US Government Accountability Office

News you may have missed #372

June 10, 2010 by intelNews Leave a comment

Afghan interior minister and spy chief removed. Afghan President Hamid Karzai has removed interior minister Hanif Atmar and national security director Amrullah Saleh, after accusing them of failing to prevent last week’s Taliban attack on the country’s parliament. It is worth noting that both officials have close ties to Washington.
Analysis: Fight looms over new US intelligence chief. Warring opinions are emerging about James R. Clapper, after US President Barack Obama announced his intention to nominate the Pentagon’s current intelligence chief to serve as director of national intelligence.
Analysis: The dangers of turning spies into generals. The CIA’s controversial Predator-drone targeted killings program blends Title 10 of the US code, which governs the military, and Title 50, which covers intelligence operations. This unnerves a number of scholars, who recall that the last time this was done on such a large scale was in the 1961 Bay of Pigs invasion.

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Did US airstrike in Yemen kill a mediator by mistake?

May 28, 2010 by intelNews Leave a comment

Predator drone

By JOSEPH FITSANAKIS | intelNews.org |
While US media are focusing on a questionable attempt by the US military to expand its clandestine activities in the Muslim world, the Pentagon has quietly intensified its unmanned drone strikes on suspected militants. Although the role of the CIA has dominated the debate about these targeted killings, it is not widely known that the US Department of Defense also carries out its own air strikes, which are separate from the CIA’s. The most recent of these was most probably launched against a target in Yemen last Monday night. The US government refuses to confirm or deny its involvement in the operation, but CBS News reported on Tuesday that the strike was aimed at “a meeting of al Qaeda operatives”. However, a subsequent news report from the Reuters news agency said that the drone strike “missed its mark” and instead killed a Yemeni government-authorized mediator who was trying to negotiate the surrender of Mohammed Jaid bin Jardan, a senior member of Al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP). Read more of this post

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Private US spy network still operating in Pakistan

May 17, 2010 by intelNews 1 Comment

US Pentagon

By IAN ALLEN | intelNews.org |
Senior US Pentagon officials continue to rely almost daily on reports from a network of contracted spies operating deep inside Afghanistan and Pakistan, according to The New York Times. Last March, when the paper revealed the existence of the network, several senior US military sources expressed serious concerns about the operation, which some say borders on illegality, and is currently under investigation by the US government. Although The Times is apparently “withholding some information about the contractor network, including some of the names of [its] agents”, it appears that the network is staffed by former CIA and Special Forces operatives. The entire operation appears to be an attempt to evade some of the stringent oversight rules under which the CIA and the US Pentagon are required to operate. Read more of this post

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News you may have missed #352

May 17, 2010 by intelNews Leave a comment

CIA rewarded extraordinary rendition supervisor. A CIA counterterrorism official who supervised the agency’s extraordinary rendition and torture of Khaled El-Masri –a German citizen who was later found to be innocent– has been promoted twice since that episode.
US Pentagon picks contractors for intel IT. The Defense Intelligence Agency has picked 11 private contractors to compete for up to $6.6 billion in information technology contracts over the next five years. They include the usual suspects, Lockheed Martin, BAE Systems, General Dynamics Corp, and Northrop Grumman, among others.
Alleged spy’s lawyers threaten trial boycott in Israel. Lawyers representing Israeli citizen Amir Makhoul, who is accused of spying on behalf of Hezbollah, have threatened to boycott an upcoming trial hearing unless they are allowed to meet with their client.

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News you may have missed #351

May 16, 2010 by intelNews Leave a comment

Former CIA agent admits role in Plame case. In an extensive interview with Truthout, former CIA counterterrorism official John Kiriakou has disclosed for the first time his role in the events that led to the outing of covert CIA operative Valerie Plame.
Indian double agent refused Pakistani handler’s marriage proposal. Madhuri Gupta, second secretary at the Indian high commission in Islamabad, Pakistan, who was arrested for working for Pakistan’s ISI spy agency, had a “relationship of personal affection” with an aide of her Pakistani handler, but says she refused his offer of marriage.
US Pentagon details Cold War mind-control tests. More than 30 years after it was written, the US Pentagon has released a memorandum detailing its involvement in the CIA’s infamous Cold War mind-control experiments.

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India blacklists Chinese phone companies over spying concerns

May 11, 2010 by intelNews 1 Comment

Huawei HQ

By IAN ALLEN | intelNews.org |
The government of India has officially barred a number of Chinese telephone equipment providers from operating in India, citing their strong links with the Chinese military. At the center of the move is Huawei Technologies, one of China’s largest telephone equipment manufacturers. Several intelligence insiders see the company, based in Shenzen, China, as a covert arm of the intelligence wing of the Chinese People’s Liberation Army. The company, which has business concerns in several countries around the world, has attracted the attention of American, British and Australian counterintelligence agencies, among others. In early 2008, the US government prohibited Huawei’s purchase of a significant amount of shares in US network security equipment maker 3Com, which supplies telecommunications hardware to the US Department of Defense. Read more of this post

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Essential links on WikiLeaks video of Iraq shooting

April 7, 2010 by intelNews 4 Comments

WikiLeaks

By JOSEPH FITSANAKIS | intelNews.org |
Whistleblower site WikiLeaks has released a leaked video taken from a US military helicopter in July 2007, showing US forces indiscriminately firing on Iraqi civilians, killing 12 people and wounding two children. The dead included two employees of the Reuters news agency. There are several edited versions of the video, which can be found in its entirety here. Cryptome offers a series of selected stills from the leaked WikiLeaks video, with some visual analysis of the footage. It is worth keeping in mind that the leaked video is of substantially lower quality than what the US helicopter pilots saw, because it was converted through several stages before it was released by WikiLeaks. Read more of this post

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News you may have missed #312

March 19, 2010 by intelNews Leave a comment

Kiwi external spies to focus on domestic intel. New Zealand’s External Assessments Bureau has announced on its website that it has been renamed the National Assessments Bureau, and will conduct more work on intelligence within New Zealand. The change follows a review of the government’s three security services, which, besides the NAB, include the Security Intelligence Service (NZSIS) and the Government Communications Security Bureau.
CIA’s European secrets: Clandestine prisons investigated. Interesting documentary on the CIA secret prison network in Europe, by Russia Today. Available freely on YouTube.
Pentagon official behind ‘rogue ops’ gives interview. US Air Force official Michael Furlong, who was identified last weekend as the father of a clandestine intelligence network of private contractors, set up possibly without supervision or approval by senior US Defense officials, has finally spoken to the media.

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News you may have missed #310

March 17, 2010 by intelNews Leave a comment

Analysis: Outsourcing Intelligence. David Ignatius points out that the latest rogue operation of the US Defense Department, revealed last weekend by The New York Times, points to the increasing irrelevance of the CIA in the so-called “global war on terrorism”: “by using contractors who operate ‘outside the wire’ in Afghanistan and Pakistan, the [US] military has gotten information that is sometimes better than what the CIA is offering”, says Ignatius.
White House threatens veto on intelligence bill. The White House has renewed its threat to veto the fiscal 2010 intelligence authorization bill over a provision that would force the administration to widen the circle of US lawmakers who are informed about covert operations and other sensitive activities.
CIA’s Kiriakou authors new book. John Kiriakou, who spent 14 years working for the CIA, and has made headlines in the past for defending the practice of waterboarding in interrogations, while recognizing it is torture, has a new book out, entitled The Reluctant Spy.

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Reports of a possible rogue US DoD operation in Pakistan

March 15, 2010 by intelNews 3 Comments

Michael Furlong

By IAN ALLEN | intelNews.org |
A New York Times article published late yesterday alleges the existence of a clandestine intelligence network of private contractors, set up by a US Pentagon employee, possibly without supervision or approval by senior US Defense officials. The network, which appears to operate under the cover of an Internet-based research company, is actually used to gather intelligence on the activities and whereabouts of individuals on the CIA’s assassination list, claims the paper. What is more, the network coordinator, retired US Air Force officer Michael D. Furlong, is currently being investigated by the US Department of Defense for fraudulent dealings with private contractors. It is not clear whether these were the same contractors (mostly former CIA and US Special Forces operatives) who were employed in the undercover intelligence network uncovered by The New York Times. Read more of this post

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News you may have missed #0280

February 4, 2010 by intelNews Leave a comment

Interview with Canadian ambassador who worked for the CIA. Iran’s Press TV has published an extensive interview with Ken Taylor, Canada’s former ambassador to Iran, who recently admitted that he secretly worked for the CIA in the late 1970s, after the US embassy in Iran was taken over by students during the Islamic Revolution. Part one of the interview is here. Parts two and three here, and parts four, five and six here.
US Pentagon’s black budget tops $56 billion. About $56 billion of the US Defense Department’s publicized 2010 budget goes simply to “classified programs” or to projects known only by their code names, like “Chalk Eagle” and “Link Plumeria”. That’s the Pentagon’s black budget, an it’s about $6 billion more than last year.
CIA agents working for private companies on the side. In the midst of two US wars and the fight against al-Qaeda, the CIA is offering operatives a chance to peddle their expertise to private companies on the side –a policy that gives financial firms and hedge funds access to the nation’s top-level intelligence talent.

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News you may have missed #0266

January 24, 2010 by intelNews Leave a comment

Convicted US Pentagon official’s mom introduced him to Chinese spy. Retired US Air Force officer James W. Fondren Jr., who was convicted in September of selling classified US government information to China, was apparently introduced to his Chinese spy handler, Tai Shen Kuo, by his mom.
CIA contractor flying surveillance missions over Haiti. Evergreen International Aviation, a controversial Oregon-based CIA contractor, is flying at least one ScanEagle surveillance drone over Haiti, supposedly on disaster recovery duty.

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News you may have missed #0264

January 22, 2010 by intelNews Leave a comment

India jails two Pakistanis on spying charges. India has jailed Adil Anjum Nazir Ahmed and Abdul Shakur Hafiz, claiming they spied on behalf of Pakistan’s Inter-Services Intelligence. The two were arrested in Lucknow in 2006.
US Pentagon re-examines PsyOp doctrine. The field of Psychological Operations (PsyOps) is among the oldest of military disciplines, but a new US Department of Defense report on the subject shows that the DoD continues to wrestle with basic definitional issues.