International Intelligence Research Articles

Big data and its strategic path to value in international firms

PurposeOne of the major trends in today’s businesses is big data (BD). While research on various aspects of BD is flourishing, little is empirically known about its impact on firms’ strategies. Furthermore, research on the use of BD and its effects in international firms is in its embryonic stage. The purpose of this paper is to explore the BD and international intelligence use relatedness and examine the impact of BD usage on firms’ strategic orientations en route its implications on business performance.Design/methodology/approachThe study proposes BD usage as a key driver of strategic orientations and accounts for a mediated relationship of BD usage with international performance through orientations. Based on data from international firms, a conceptual framework is tested using regressions, path analyses, and additional robustness checks.FindingsBD appears as having a decidedly strategic focus, and its usage enhances international performance through strategic orientations. The influence of BD is stronger than the influence of any subset of studied orientations. Notably, this influence is strongest when the orientations are treated individually.Research limitations/implicationsThis study furthers contemporary understanding of the international intelligence use system. Notably, it challenges traditional management perceptions that suggest a chosen strategy determines the selection of data, and instead provides evidence that modern firms have altered this approach by embracing opportunities for new strategic value creation presented by BD. Managers should emphasize BD usage throughout strategic orientations.Originality/valueThe study is the first to provide theoretical and practical reflections on the use of BD in firms’ strategies. Its contributions face up established literature of the causal direction of strategy choices and data applicability in international settings.

What do judges say on the protection of intelligence secrets?

ABSTRACTThis article discusses the role of the discourse of law in legitimizing the protection of intelligence secrets. It draws on examples from the United Kingdom and the United States to illustrate rhetorical regularities with respect to the need to protect intelligence officers, agents, sources and methods, the effectiveness of intelligence agencies, international intelligence relationships and the effects of a mosaic of disclosed information. It concludes that judges produce specialized knowledge on state secrecy that plays a part in shaping the understanding of state secrecy in society.

Intelligence-sharing in the context of policing transnational serious and organized crime: a note on policy and practice in an Australian setting

ABSTRACTAn increasingly globalised world brings with it unprecedented complexities in international intelligence sharing. The continual integration of international markets and services, amid the ongoing disruption of digital technologies, is driving the need for greater collaboration and cooperation between countries. The flows of people, goods, ideas and information are increasing each year in tandem with the global reach of terrorism. Global reliance on the internet for commerce and communication also exposes countries and organizations to cyber-attack. Significant increases in borderless crime, the rising incidence of global political fragility, and shifts in multi-jurisdictional crime all compel law enforcement, intelligence and security agencies to continually re-evaluate existing approaches and policies. The ability of police to attack transnational organized crime at its source, or at a transit point that offers opportunities for effective disruption, is now more important than ever. This essay describes a study conducted by the Australian Strategic Policy Institute that identified a number of crucial issues with Australia’s criminal intelligence efforts offshore. It explains why it is important to foster a culture of offshore criminal intelligence, looks at challenges associated with the current system, and suggests ways to overcome those challenges. The research confirms that Australia’s efforts to collect and disseminate criminal intelligence, as distinct from routine international liaison, is ripe for improvement.

Why Are State Secrets Protected from Disclosure? The Discourse of Secret Keepers

ABSTRACTThis article examines, through legal documents, the rationalities that regularly give legitimacy to state secrecy from the point of view of the secret keepers. These rationalities cover the protection of intelligence officers, sources and methods, the effectiveness of intelligence agencies, international intelligence relationships, and against the effect of a mosaic of disclosed information. It concludes that the discourse of secret keepers concerning the reasons justifying the protection of state secrets from disclosure is straightforward, rather unsophisticated, and unburdened with detailed and convincing supporting evidence: it focuses on identifying possible risks associated with disclosures in general, but these risks are rarely specific in terms of a cause-to-effect relationship. The discourse of secret keepers, therefore, is credible, but only up to a point. It is nonetheless governing and commanding because it has the full force of the state behind it, up to and including the head of state, and because, ultimately, it is the responsibility of the state to protect its citizens from harm.

الآثار الاقتصادية لسياسات مکافحة الإرهاب . ECONOMIC EFFECTS OF ANTI-TERRORISM POLICY

الآثار الاقتصادية لسياسات مکافحة الإرهاب . ECONOMIC EFFECTS OF ANTI-TERRORISM POLICY

The Dutch Committee of Inquiry on the War in Iraq and the Basis in International Law for the Military Intervention

On 12 January 2010, the Dutch Committee of Inquiry into the War in Iraq presented its report to Prime Minister Jan-Peter Balkenende and provided copies to both houses of Parliament. The Committee (also known as the Davids Committee after its chairperson) had been established by the Dutch cabinet on 6 March 2009 to conduct an independent inquiry into the decision-making process leading to Dutch political (but not military) support of the US/UK invasion in Iraq in 2003, and into aspects of international law, intelligence and information gathering as well as alleged Dutch military involvement in Iraq. This article first provides a brief review of the terms of reference of the Committee, its working methods and the...

International Intelligence Liaison in the Afghan Theatre of War: Strategic Interests and Hierarchical Relations

ABSTRACTInternational intelligence liaison remains an essential tool for international actors in any theatre of war, whether dealing with covert action or information sharing. Strategic interest as a driver for liaison is a subject that has been widely examined over the years, but hierarchies between international actors within the field of intelligence liaison is a subject only a few scholars have touched upon. Within the framework of the Afghan Theatre of War—set during both the Soviet occupation of the country and the current international security mission—this work draws on the knowledge and experiences from academics and professionals in trying to reveal how strong states apply highly structured hierarchies when liaising with in-theatre national intelligence services in order to reach certain strategic objectives. At the same time, the purpose is also to critically examine the false assumption that the same powerful states exercise some kind of monopoly over the interpretation of intelligence liaison agreements with lesser powerful states. Afghanistan serves as an evident and suitable case because of its contemporary relevance but also due to the lack of systematic comparison of intelligence liaison in the region.

Cyber Crime: A Threat to Indian Society

Cyber crime is emerging as a serious threat to the Indian society as al social problem. Cyber crime as a means of offending operates in white collar crime, economic crime, intellectual property infringement, telecommunications crime and in the civil jurisdiction. The common feature is the use of information technology (computers) in their commission. At the national and international level governments, police departments and intelligence agencies are seriously thinking about how to check and control the growing menace of cyber crime in our society. Serious efforts are being planned to curb cross border cyber threats. Indian police has initiated special cyber cells across the country and have started educating and training the Police personnel. The present article is an attempt to provide a glimpse on cyber crime in India based on the latest Crime In India 2014 reports.

Identification of Associations between Clinical Signs and Hosts to Monitor the Web for Detection of Animal Disease Outbreaks

In a context of intensification of international trade and travels, the transboundary spread of emerging human or animal pathogens represents a growing concern. One of the missions of the national veterinary services is to implement international epidemiological intelligence for a timely and accurate detection of emerging animal infectious diseases (EAID) worldwide, and take early actions to prevent their introduction on the national territory. For this purpose, an efficient use of the information published on the web is essential. The authors present a comprehensive method for identification of relevant associations between terms describing clinical signs and hosts to build queries to monitor the web for early detection of EAID. Using text and web mining approaches, they present statistical measures for automatic selection of relevant associations between terms. In addition, expert elicitation is used to highlight the most relevant terms and associations among those automatically selected. The authors assessed the performance of the combination of the automatic approach and expert elicitation to monitor the web for a list of selected animal pathogens.

Spies and Scientologists: ASIO and a controversial minority religion in Cold War Australia, 1956–83

Among all the controversial New Religious Movements to emerge since the Second World War, the Church of Scientology has arguably been subject to more scrutiny by domestic and international intelligence agencies than any other non-Islamic alternative religious group. While owing to the nature of intelligence gathering scholarly accounts of this have often been one-dimensional and brief, the situation in Australia resulting from the Archives Act 1983 has meant that historians of both intelligence agencies and new religions now have access to a significant amount of documentation illustrating the interactions between the Church of Scientology and the Australian Security Intelligence Organization (ASIO) for the period from 1956 to 1983. This period witnessed vacillating fortunes for the Church of Scientology which saw it become the subject of legislative bans in three Australian state jurisdictions during the late 1960s, as well as it launching a high profile, but ultimately unsuccessful, legal case against ASIO in 1979. While never considered a serious security risk by ASIO, the Church of Scientology played a minor role in a number of important events in the history of ASIO particularly during the 1970s, including participating in a wider activist campaign which sought to curtail ASIO’s operations during this period and making submissions to the first Royal Commission into the Australian Intelligence Services under Justice Robert Marsden Hope.

The US Government and the Italian coup manqué of 1964: the unintended consequences of intelligence hierarchies

In the summer of 1964, Italian security forces and the President of the Republic attempted to remove the US-backed Italian center-left government. The attempt did not succeed, but the threat to do so was used to curtail the government’s reformist program. This article shows that the State Department and the CIA misunderstood the plans of the Italian President and security officers, dismissing the possibility of a forceful removal of the center-left, despite having a long-standing hierarchical relationship with Italian intelligence. US officials failed because of poor analytic tradecraft and because of two unintended consequences of international intelligence hierarchies: an excessive reliance on liaison over penetrations and the increased freedom of maneuver of Italian intelligence when faced with multiple, competing principals.

Developing International Intelligence Liaison Against Islamic State: Approaching “One for All and All for One”?

The summer of 2015 heralded the beginning of “Year Two” of the U.S.-led international coalition's airstrikes against Islamic State (IS)—also known interchangeably as the Islamic State of Iraq and a...

International Intelligence in Spain: An Approach to Information Resources for Business

The concept of international intelligence has taken on a greater importance for companies seeking to internationalize and access foreign markets. An exhaustive environmental scan—including international competitors, suppliers, clients in target countries, legislation and the political situation in other territories, and others—involves gathering the necessary information, its analysis and subsequent dissemination, and decision making. Within the context of the important role to be played by information management professionals who are specialized in foreign information, this article describes the information resources that Spanish companies have available to them that can assist them as they enter foreign markets.

The ‘Incredible Wrongness’ of Nikita Khrushchev: The CIA and the Cuban Missile Crisis

AbstractThe role of the CIA in the Cuban Missile Crisis was of crucial importance to events and decisions. This article explores and evaluates the activities of the CIA in the crisis. It examines how intelligence‐gathering and analysis were conducted and how assessments and information were provided to decision‐makers. The study of the crisis illuminates many aspects of intelligence. On some of these there remain debates. The significance of CIA covert action against Cuba prior to October 1962, for example, is explored. Another important focus is the mistaken assessment of the US intelligence community that the Soviets were not going to deploy nuclear missiles in Cuba. The nature and significance of this conclusion is considered, along with the views of the Director of Central Intelligence, John McCone, who contrary to his analysts, believed Khrushchev would deploy nuclear missiles. The view that the CIA played a successful part in monitoring the Soviet military build‐up after the discovery of medium‐range ballistic missiles is analysed. The lack of success in identifying Soviet tactical nuclear weapons is also considered. The article draws upon an extensive corpus of scholarship on the crisis, as well as declassified material and reflections of former officials. Research into the crisis extends to Soviet and other decision‐makers and thus helps facilitate a more genuinely international intelligence history of the Cold War. The article proffers a reflective and nuanced assessment that underlines the achievements as well as the shortcomings of the CIA at this most crucial moment in the Cold War.

Artificial harmony

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to explain that the commonly used method allowing for inter-agency cooperation between national financial intelligence units, the memorandum of understanding, is inadequate and ineffective in creating a cooperative global financial intelligence unit capable of combating money laundering typologies on an international scale. Design/methodology/approach – Methods of international financial intelligence unit (FIU) cooperation have chiefly occurred in two ways: first, through the efforts of the Egmont Group; and second, through the inclusion of provisions concerning FIUs contained in international legal documents. The first is an impossibility. Findings – This paper proposes that the result of implementation of the 2012 Financial Action Task Force Recommendations will be an informal network of FIUs where the Egmont group acts as a centralized operator for information exchange, effectively creating an informal global FIU (“GFIU”), but that this system, or a cooperative global financial intelligence unit system based on FIU-to-FIU exchanges will not allow for effective multilateral, international cooperation. Research limitations/implications – This is because national interests and unfamiliarity with capabilities provided in the Egmont Group’s cooperative platform have and will continue to result in under-utilization of cooperative efforts, and because the traditional mechanism employed for FIU-to-FIU exchanges, the memorandum of understanding (“MOU”), makes uniform or standardized information request and transfer procedures that are required for multilateral or multi-agency efforts to combat money laundering across international boundaries an impossibility. Practical implications – The Egmont Group’s cooperational structure should be the primary means by which to achieve a GFIU. Social implications – The global combat on money laundering will be more effective, thereby more fully protecting the global economy. Originality/value – A comparison between the Egmont Group’s network building mechanism and the existing use of MoU to create global cooperation against money laundering has not been analyzed.

Anglo-Soviet Intelligence Cooperation, 1941–45: Normative Insights from the Dyadic Democratic Peace Literature

This article leverages normative insights from the dyadic democratic peace literature to assess whether the configuration of regime types within an intelligence alliance can shape the depth of cooperation between its members. The Anglo-Soviet intelligence alliance (1941–45) is considered as an initial plausibility probe of this argument. Evidence is found to support the premise that cooperation between the intelligence services of a democracy and an autocracy is constrained by the absence of the democratic norms of bounded uncertainty and contingent consent. The article concludes with recommendations on how future scholarship can further explore the relationship between regime type and the depth of international intelligence cooperation.

International Verification and Intelligence

Both national intelligence agencies (NIAs) and international verification organizations (IVOs) attempt to assess compliance with arms control treaties. Their strengths and weaknesses are complementary. Because IVOs are seen as legitimate, they are able to conduct on-site inspections to verify declared activities and to confirm or disprove allegations of clandestine cheating. NIAs are more flexible and have a greater ability to uncover preliminary evidence of clandestine activities on which further investigations can be based. Such investigations require NIAs to share intelligence with IVOs. While this kind of intelligence sharing is generally permitted by arms control agreements, it is controversial. Nonetheless, it appears to have become more common in recent years, particularly during the International Atomic Energy Agency's investigation of Iran's nuclear program. While intelligence sharing creates risks for both IVOs and NIAs, it is ultimately critical to the effective verification of arms control agreements and steps can and should be taken to ensure it becomes more common and less controversial.

Sharing Secrets: A Game Theoretic Analysis of International Intelligence Cooperation

During the lead-up to the 2003 invasion of Iraq, the governments of the United States and United Kingdom jointly made public a range of previously secret intelligence to bolster claims that Saddam ...

Charm Offensive Or 'Axis Of Evil'? An Analysis Of The Iranian Nuclear Program And American Responses

This paper assesses the likelihood that Iran’s nuclear program poses a threat to American foreign-policy interests and the extent to which the American response has succeeded in reducing this threat. The researcher conducted this assessment using publicly available data from governmental or intergovernmental agencies such as the IAEA and the CIA, think tanks such as the Brookings Institute, and contemporary press reports. The findings indicate that Iran’s nuclear program has some military aspects, which might pose a threat to American security interests either by emboldening the Iranian leadership to engage in brinksmanship or by increasing the Israeli perception of Iran as a threat. This threat appears to be exacerbated by the failure of most American responses to reduce the threat from the nuclear program, with the partial exceptions of the sanctions regimes and cyberwarfare tactics applied to Iran. In 2009, an Iranian nuclear scientist named Shahram Amiri vanished while on a pilgrimage to Mecca, raising suspicions in the Iranian media that he had been kidnapped. They were proved partially right after Amiri turned up in Tucson claiming to be a defector. The resulting cascade of media claims and counterclaims—Amiri later claimed to have been kidnapped, while Iranian media suggested that he was a double agent-was one of many moves in a key part of American foreign policy: the shadow war over Iran’s nuclear program. The Iranian nuclear program dates back to the reign of Shah Reza Pahlavi, during the alliance between the United States and Iran. However, this program was continued well after Pahlavi’s reign and into the strongly anti-American government of the Ayatollah Khomeini. 2 In spite of Iranian claims to the contrary, international intelligence agencies therefore have long suspected that Iran’s post-Pahlavi nuclear program may have a military purpose. Consequently, the questions of greatest concern regarding Iran’s nuclear program are: 1) “Does Iran’s nuclear program pose a threat to American interests?” and 2) “What responses are most likely to have a 1 Crist, David. The Twilight War: The Secret History Of America’s Thirty-Year Conflict With Iran. 2012. Penguin. Pg.554. 2 Berman, Illan. Tehran Rising: Iran’s Challenge To The United States. 2005. Rowan & Littlefield, Oxford. Pg. 32. 3 Amano, Yuki. “IAEA Board Report.” 5 June 2013. IAEA. http://www.iaea.org/Publications/Documents/Board/2013/gov2013-27.pdf Pg. 13. 1 Menon: The Iranian Nuclear Program And American Responses, 2000-2012

Governmental Efforts and Strategies to Reinforce Security in Cyberspace

The Internet is changing the world by bringing new ways to communicate to people and supporting open society and economic growth. The decrease in connection costs means accessing the Internet will become cheaper and easier, allowing more people around the world to use it. Increasing our dependency on the digital world brings new opportunities but also new threats. The more we open information and support digital mediums, the less guarded we become against the people and groups aiming to attack our digital intimacy. This openness also has certain effects on the soundness of the digital information of governments. Governments also have started to make effective use of digital technology over the last three decades. Hackers, leakers, international intelligence units and illegal groups target strategic digital networks, Internet sites and the infrastructures of governmental organizations as well as individual and private companies. Governments have started to develop strategies against these cyber-attacks, including legislative measures to protect themselves. Events in cyberspace happen at high speed and answering to these attacks and developing protections immediately are crucial points of cyber security. As the nature of the technology requires high speed development, governments need to adopt dynamic strategies against these attacks. Moreover, the cross-border nature of threats makes it essential to improve international cooperation.