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*

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

[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

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 ...