Internet Giving Rise To "Citizen Spies"

reporter writes "According to a startling report by the Wall Street Journal, the Internet has empowered ordinary people to be part-time intelligence officers, uncovering secrets like military facilities and prison camps across the landscape of North Korea. The report states, '[Curtis] Melvin is at the center of a dozen or so citizen snoops who have spent the past two years filling in the blanks on the map of one of the world's most secretive countries. Seeking clues in photos, news reports and eyewitness accounts, they affix labels to North Korean structures and landscapes captured by Google Earth, an online service that stitches satellite pictures into a virtual globe. The result is an annotated North Korea of rocket-launch sites, prison camps and elite palaces on white-sand beaches. "It's democratized intelligence," says Mr. Melvin. More than 35,000 people have downloaded Mr. Melvin's file, North Korea Uncovered. It has grown to include thousands of tags in categories such as "nuclear issues" (alleged reactors, missile storage), dams (more than 1,200 countrywide) and restaurants (47). Its Wikipedia approach to spying shows how Soviet-style secrecy is facing a new challenge from the Internet's power to unite a disparate community of busybodies.'"

Comments

In Soviet Internet

[Anonymous Coward]

Citizens spy on you?

*ducks*

Re:In Soviet Internet

[gnick]

So what? Security through obscurity has pretty well been written off. We used to identify Russian special-nuclear-material sites by looking for the buildings with 3-layer fences and sniper towers. Our sites are identifiable the same way. Solution? 3-layer fences, sniper towers, and undisclosed underground protection. You can no longer hide your facilities, you just protect them and keep anything super-sensitive under a closed roof in a building with no open windows.

Re:In Soviet Internet

[Psyborgue]

Bah. The government has nothing to hide. There is plenty of oversight. Trust them!

Re:In Soviet Internet

[Whiternoise]

Or, like most top secret installations these days, you dig and avoid the problem entirely. Facilities like NORAD, for instance (and you think if anything has ever existed at Area 51 it's above ground?).

The UK (and no doubt the US and similar) government employs researchers with the sole task of poring over satellite pictures to determine the capacity of power plants, populations of regions and in general "what things are and what they can do". They also have far more high resolution satellite images than Google is allowed to produce.

We've been doing this kind of thing for years and still are. The only difference now is that the public can give it a go.

Reminds me of the famous incident concerning one of the first Nuclear tests when a university professor used dimensional analysis to calculate what the detonation payload was (a classified figure at the time) based on a photo that was published in the papers (that was the last time the US Military put scales on their photos :P).

Re:In Soviet Internet

[Anonymous Coward]

> You are a paranoid tin-foil hatter.

You say that like its a bad thing....

Oh Boy

[cbs4385]

Does this mean I get to act out my favorite moments from 24 on that creepily suspicious neighbor of mine, the one who speaks that foreigner lingo in with his so call family? I can't wait. Now where'd I put my home waterboarding kit...

Not _SPIES_, intel analysts

[redelm]

There's a _huge_ difference between people on the ground who go look at things and talk to people, and people who analyse the photos people on the ground or in the sky/space have taken.

For one thing, analysts aren't in hostile territory and subject to arrest.

Re:Not _SPIES_, intel analysts

[nametaken]

Yeah, my initial thought was, aren't there LOTS of people who work for our intelligence agencies doing this with much better imagery and expertise, augmented by feet on the ground?

Re:Not _SPIES_, intel analysts

[ickleberry]

True. You're not a real spy unless you build a UAV and fly it over North Korea, or a MAV if you have the balls (or a death wish).

It would be a fun project, launch it from Russia or South Korea - not China because NK & China are good communist brothers. You can have it connect to the interwebs using Thuraya, Inmarsat and maybe use an Orbcomm transceiver as backup. I suppose ideally you'd want a dirigible or something that can stay in the air for extended periods without producing much heat that missiles would pick up on. Once in the country's interior you could lower its altitude and get some nice detailed shots. You could control it directly by radio but this makes you far too easy to trace - internet connectivity allows you to GTFO once the thing is launched.

The problem would be getting something to power the thing - microjets pump out too much heat, solar power alone probably won't give you the required amount of oomph to fly the thing. You could go unpowered, launch when there is a good breeze blowing into North Korea and deflate once it reaches another country. There was a slashdot story about a bunch of students who made something similar but I don't think they ever flew it over North Korea

Re:Not _SPIES_, intel analysts

[Omnifarious]

No, you're not a real spy until you actually become a part of the North Korean military in order to report on what it's up to and what kind of orders you're getting.

Our intelligence agencies have lost their edge precisely because they don't want to do that kind of thing. But that's what real spies do and where useful intelligence comes from.

And citizens could get involved in this if there were people who lived in North Korea wanted to do something horribly risky because they wanted to make their government look bad. I actually hope the Internet does spawn this kind of spying.

Re:Not _SPIES_, intel analysts

[SEWilco]

Still not a spy. The intelligence community has lots of members with different roles. Spies are the ones who go in and talk to the people. Unless you shake the hand of the enemy (or whatever their culture does), you're not a spy.

Does it count if the enemy recoils in fear after feeling your metallic handshake?

Re:You too can be James Bond

[CRCulver]

I would think this newfounding spying power would be mainly limited to Google Earth. Walking around in an oppressive regime with ultra-miniaturized electronics can often draw great suspicion.

best definition yet

[owlnation]

Its Wikipedia approach to spying shows how Soviet-style secrecy is facing a new challenge from the Internet's power to unite a disparate community of busybodies

Wikipedia: a disparate community of busybodies. Yep, pretty much the best definition I've heard.

But lets hope the quality of these citizen intelligence officers is vastly superior to the average wikipedian. Using wikipedia-based information might get you a fail mark, a libel suit, minor injuries, or a variety of other personal problems. However, using poor intelligence information might get us all nuked, or start a major war. (citation: see Iran, Weapons of Mass destruction, intelligence failure thereof)

Some books on the subject

[hughperkins]

Some books on the subject:

• "The Transparent Society", by David Brin
• "I See You", by Damon Knight
• "Total Surveillance, by Hugh Perkins

And what of other "open" countries?

[MartinSchou]

I wonder what kind of trouble you'd get in if you made a similarly detailed map of all military installations (secret or otherwise) in the US or the UK.

Considering the oproar over showing where schools, churches and Cheney's residence are, I wouldn't be surprised if it was more difficult to get it done for the US than for North Korea ...

Re:And what of other "open" countries?

[chill]

None? At least in the U.S.

Head on over to Google Maps and start looking up things like Bangor, WA, which is a major Trident Nuclear Sub base. Feel free to explore both the street map and the satellite view to compare.
http://maps.google.com/maps?f=q&source=s_q&hl=en&geocode=&q=bangor,+wa&sll=44.662793,-68.720169&sspn=0.363355,0.892639&ie=UTF8&ll=47.715537,-122.739601&spn=0.085929,0.22316&t=h&z=13

Notice what Microsoft's mapping gathered from there? Oopsie!
http://tech.blorge.com/Structure:%20/2007/09/04/microsofts-mapping-service-uncovers-top-secret-us-submarine/

Maybe browse a website dedicated to secret U.S. military bases?
http://www.anomalies-unlimited.com/Bases.html

The U.S. and the rest of the world, especially the major powers, have dealt with satellite overviews since the 1960s. Anything real interesting is underground and out of view.

Re:And what of other "open" countries?

[Anonymous Coward]

Head on over to Google Maps and start looking up things like Bangor, WA, which is a major Trident Nuclear Sub base. Feel free to explore both the street map and the satellite view to compare.

Having spent a lot of time at Bangor, I can say with confidence that being able to see the base, and knowing in any kind of detail what goes on there are two very different things.
 
 

The U.S. and the rest of the world, especially the major powers, have dealt with satellite overviews since the 1960s. Anything real interesting is underground and out of view.

 
Nah. The real interesting stuff takes place in banal looking buildings that don't appear any different from the ones around them. The most interesting building at Bangor looks like a warehouse - one of several in the complex.

Re:And what of other "open" countries?

[MartinSchou]

Granted, but it's not like we've never heard or seen Bangor naval base before. Or Area 51. Or any of the other major military installations.

But what exactly is being hidden here?

A ~25 x 3 mile black strip in Canada and Alaska ...

Re:And what of other "open" countries?

[chill]

Nothing. It was a camera glitch. Notice, because Alaska isn't high priority, that all levels of zoom are from the same photo set? Watch the clouds, they never move.

Then check other sources like Microsoft's Virtual Earth and see what is "hidden".

http://maps.live.com/default.aspx?v=2&FORM=LMLTCP&cp=62.244908~-141.222382&style=h&lvl=12&tilt=-90&dir=0&alt=-1000&phx=0&phy=0&phscl=1&encType=1

Keep this story in mind

[timeOday]

Keep this story in mind the next time you hear about "China" hacking DoD computers - we don't know whether or not the govt. is behind hacks from a given country, assuming the attacks even originate from there, it could just be bored geeks in their mom's basements.

And keep this story in mind the next time an "American" (they always turn out to be dual citizens) is arrested for spying in Iran or China - we don't know whether a US citizen has been doing some un-sanctioned spying on another country. Even if they're not on the CIA payroll, it could be business interests, it could be family ties, it could be a grudge, and after reading this story I realize it could just be flat out idle curiosity?

The death of newspapers

[MillionthMonkey]

Every time I hear about the death of newspapers, I wonder how the efforts of a small number of full time reporters would match up to the lackadaisical efforts of a million maternal basement dwellers with Internet connections.

I'm not sure...

[Nakoruru]

I'm not sure that I want the same pool of people that believe in faces on Mars, and other hoaxes, interpreting photos of North Korea.

Wikileaks

[HalAtWork]

Wikileaks has also played an important role in revealing secrets. In addition, Wikipedia also helps people disseminate information that is direct and to the point, in plain language, with references and with links to articles containing more specific information. It's an invaluable tool for knowledge. I hope it never disappears, and I am glad that they offer burnt-to-DVD versions of articles.

Plus, every time I visit a web site for information, I save it, because I never know if that information will disappear or change. When I go back, I save another copy so I can compare, and also so I can retain information in previous copies should I need to reference it.