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CIA Details Its Wikipedia-Like Tools For Analysts

Posted by samzenpus on from the facebook-without-faces dept.

hhavensteincw writes "If you think selling Web 2.0 in your organization is hard, some early backers of a Wikipedia-like project at the Central Intelligence Agency were called traitors and told they 'would get someone killed' by their efforts. But Intellipedia — the CIA's version of Wikipedia — now is so heavily used by analysts that the agency is using it in its security briefings, according to two of the CIA employees who work on the project. Intellipedia has been expanded since it was first launched so that now it boasts its own YouTube-like channel for video and Flickr-like photo sharing as well as a wiki where workers can debate different intel information."

5 of 164 comments (clear)

  1. I guess by travelmug · · Score: 5, Insightful

    I don't see how this will improve the accuracy of the information. It will just help poor intel get passed more efficiently.

    1. Re:I guess by SirLurksAlot · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Efficiency in dissemination is just as important as accuracy. Getting accurate information earlier to more people can save everyone a lot of trouble.

      --
      God, schmod. I want my monkey man!
    2. Re:I guess by dedazo · · Score: 4, Insightful
      Think about it for a second. Intelligence is nothing more than putting lots of disparate little facts together into a semi-coherent view of a given situation. What better than a massive hyperlinked encyclopedia-like information repository for this?

      At the expense of sounding slightly ridiculous, imagine how much mileage they're going to get out of the "What links here" function!?

      If they use it correctly (and the weakest link here is the prompt input of information) then I can't see this not being anything but good.

      --
      Web2.0: I love when people Flickr my cuil and digg my boingboing until my google is reddit and I start to yahoo
  2. It makes a lot of sense... by Coopjust · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Having a collaborative tool that makes it easier to keep profiles up to date is better.

    The CIA also doesn't have to worry about vandalism- no one is going to blank a page and replace it to the word "penis" when every edit is tied to their name... plus, being in the CIA is serious work, so I'd imagine the maturity level is higher anyways.

  3. It is vital, in fact by Sycraft-fu · · Score: 5, Insightful

    If nobody knows the intelligence information, and nobody can put together a full picture, well then it is useless. For example while hindsight is always 20/20, it still looks as though the government had all the information to put together what was going to happen on 9/11. The problem was, there wasn't a good way of accessing and analyzing it. It wasn't like there was a report saying "Terrorists will hit the towers on this day," it was little fragments all over. Well, all those little fragments ended up doing no good. Nobody was ever able to put it together, and thus there was no warning that would have allowed prevention.

    Had there been efficient dissemination of the information, it is possible some analyst would have put it all together and then been able to generate a report that would be acted on.