May 2011
The OSINT Group launches Operation Jellyfish
http://www.presstv.ir/detail/179629.html http://www.washingtonian.com/blogarticles/people/capitalcomment/19436.html
March 2011
Intelligence Firm Offers Unique Public Access to Private Government Information, “Gray Research” Services
The OSINT Group, a boutique private intelligence firm based in Washington DC launched today an innovative new information operations service that delivers a unique combination of market news and data, geopolitical analysis and “gray research” services while offering direct access to its intelligence operations team.
The service also contains proprietary information on over 170 governments, military and intelligence agencies representing 250 countries and territories worldwide. Previously available only to certain governments and military clients over 40 years through its Defense & Foreign Affairs team, the Global Intelligence Report is now available to the general public, institutional investors, multi-national corporations and other sophisticated news consumers.
The Global Intelligence Report delivers timely original content on important industry news from emerging markets, informative economic research, and insightful geopolitical analysis by using a combination of its human network of assets around the world and the latest technical innovations used to conduct open source intelligence gathering by governments and military establishments.
"We provide clients with tomorrow's headlines today by using a team of intelligence operations professionals, internationally acclaimed reporters and journalists, academic scholars and a collection of over 200 assets operating in capital cities around the world," said Michael Bagley, operations director for the Global Intelligence Report and president of The OSINT Group. "Our colleagues on the Defense & Foreign Affairs team have been providing geopolitical analysis and intelligence to private government and military clients for over 40 years," Bagley said.
Additionally, to help clients better understand how Washington works and how certain legislation taking shape on Capitol Hill can affect certain industries, the Global Intelligence Report also offers insight and analysis from its political intelligence operations team in Washington DC.
"We have syndicated the cost of the traditional 'K Street’ business model because most clients - especially international clients - don't need to visit a congressman or a senator. They just need to know how certain new regulations or newly passed legislation might affect their business or their industry," Bagley said.
With a personalized consulting approach and direct phone access, the political intelligence team can provide many of the same details on important bills such as financial services, defense or energy and climate change legislation at a fraction of the cost of an expensive Washington lobbying firm.
“When it comes to analysis of global hot spots, emerging markets and geopolitical trends – whether it be pipeline politics, security and investment risk, natural resource conflicts, or internal politics that affect entire industries – the Global Intelligence Report provides a unique network of experts and assets around the world who can explain the situation simply,” Jen Alic, editorial director, and former editor-in-chief of ISN Security Watch, said.
February 2010
Wall Street Firms, Hedge Funds, Recruit CIA, Ex-Military Intelligence
http://www.wallstreetandtech.com/showArticle.jhtml?articleID=222700382
Wall Street firms and hedge funds are actively recruiting former CIA and military intelligence officers in a bid to boost their security and risk management practices by looking for expertise outside the corporate world.
Financial firms are particularly eager to recruit former Afghan and Iraq war vets with intelligence operations experience since they can bring new technology and techniques to research and analysis, according to Michael Bagley, founder and president of Washington D.C.-based financial intelligence firm, The OSINT Group.
Washington publication Politico recently reported that the CIA is offering their members a chance to offer their expertise to private companies. "In one case, these active-duty officers moonlighted at a hedge-fund consulting firm that wanted to tap their expertise in "deception detection," the highly specialized art of telling when executives may be lying based on clues in a conversation," the publication stated.
The OSINT Group itself includes operatives formerly connected to a classified military intelligence program known as "Operation Able Danger," which used open source intelligence methods, data mining techniques and link analysis that ultimately identified several of the 9/11 hijackers prior to the attacks in New York and Washington, Bagley said.
Today, the private sector needs timely, relevant and actionable "intelligence" to secure their businesses against potential threats, he explains. Some of this intelligence can be produced with open source information publicly available information that anyone can lawfully obtain.
The OSINT Group, which counts among its clients a private equity firm based in Beijing, as well as a U.S. hedge fund, specializes in providing firms with analysis of what it calls "gray" literature, which consists of written information produced by the private sector, government sources and academia that is available only on a limited basis, either because few copies are produced, the existence of the material is largely unknown, or access to information is not readily available on the web.
To analyze this wealth of largely untapped research, the OSINT Group uses an advanced analytical toolkit for pattern discovery, link analysis, data visualization and network-centric analysis. It presents data using graphical displays to show underlying relationships and patterns, and can deliver it to clients in different formats, including email alerts.
Services provided by Visual Analytics, the third-party vendor The OSINT Group works with, include placement algorithms to visually show networks of related data, weighted groups of relationships, value occurrence frequency, patterns of activity and event sequences, as well as data capture and transmission tools enabling real-time, online collaboration.
Beyond the technology it uses, the OSINT Group's key value lies in its personnel's ability to access intelligence that financial firms normally do not know how to find, analyze it and deliver it in a range of different formats.
"We use technology used by the U.S. intelligence community. Our approach, how we use the data, how we connect it, is different (from other research firms), Bagley said in an interview with Wall Street & Technology. "We specialize in accessing government data or academic data."
Particularly hot at the moment is research pertaining to upcoming financial reform legislature, he adds.
"It's very hard for people outside DC to understand financial services reform legislature. We can help clients understand what it is, what it means, by analyzing committee reports and bills. We also access academic data, so if a particular professor does a presentation, we can access the data, extract and refine it, and put it into an easier-to-read report," he says.
The OSINT Group was initially geared towards the military and intelligence community, but Bagely realized his company's expertise could translate to the corporate sector.
"We're used to carrying out a mission in a high-stress situation using military intelligence. We have technology, training, expertise and a unique breed of talent," he says.
Still, just as reports emerged that hedge funds and other financial firms are increasingly turning to intelligence experts , U.S. intelligence chiefs -- worried about a potential conflict of interest as well as brain drain -- said they will review policies allowing them to moonlight for private companies.
Testifying before the House Intelligence Committee in early February, Director of National Intelligence Dennis Blair said he'd send a report on the topic to Rep. Anna Eshoo, D-Calif., according to Politico.
Referring to revelations that CIA employees had worked for hedge funds and financial firms to apply sophisticated deception detection techniques to their investment and management practices, Eshoo told Blair that she found reports that came out over the last few days "disturbing. I really find them disturbing."
She added: "I think we need to have a full review of it. I think there is a real potential for conflict, so I think we need to know, she said. It sounded more like fiction to me than fact, and that's why I raise it," Politico reported, adding that Blair promised to produce a report on the situation.
Responding to Blair's comments, the OSINT Group's Bagely contends that the "intelligence community should pay more attention to fixing the operational security compromises across the community itself rather than outsourcing their current employees to private companies for part-time work."
"Government employees working for the intelligence agencies should be focusing on 'information sharing' rather than working elsewhere on weekends or after hours," he says.
"Private corporations have already succeeded where few foreign governments have: they've penetrated the CIA and they are integrally involved in the intelligence community's most sensitive and secretive clandestine and covert programs. Nothing is off-limits," he adds.
"It is not necessary for current government employees to be working on the side for private corporations with the advances in information technology and the number of companies offering 'unique expertise' that are staffed with former or retired members of various intelligence agencies."
CIA Operatives Moonlight for Corporations, Financial Institutions
The CIA allows operatives a chance to offer their expertise to private companies and hedge funds on the side.
http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0110/32290.html
December 10, 2009
Wall Street Soaks Up Research Business
http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/642fae88-e128-11de-af7a-00144feab49a.html?nclick_check=1
Contact us to learn how we can help you as an outside research support team.
December 1, 2009
Goldman, Hedge Funds Fishing In New Data Waters
http://www.reuters.com/article/rbssFinancialServicesAndRealEstateNews/idUSGEE5B014020091201
Contact us to learn how we can help you by thinking "out of the box" with the technology that the military, law enforcenment and intelligence communities are using.
November 22, 2009
Hedge Funds Keep Watch on Washington
http://www.businessweek.com/investor/content/sep2009/pi20090922_204361.htm
Contact us to learn how we can help you understand the policy moves taking shape on Capitol Hill that affect your investment risks and opportunities.
November 16-18, 2009
The OSINT Group was represented on two panels at the 5th Annual Intelligence Analysis and Processing Summit in Washington DC.
Intelligence priorities are shifting given the new administration and DNI Director Dennis Blair. The "Vision 2015" document laid out by the Intelligence Community envisions integrated foreign, military and domestic intelligence capabilities.
Although there is a roadmap outlined, there are still troubling gaps and crucial questions in regards to agency interoperability, analysis techniques and processing methods.
The 5th Intelligence Analysis and Processing Summit addressed these issues and how they relate to supporting national security strategy.
Aside from The OSINT Group, participating organizations and entities included Military Intelligence Agencies, Federal Civilian Intelligence Agencies, State Fusion Centers, Emergency Management Agencies and local/state level security officials.
November 1, 2009
The OSINT Group signs an exclusive syndication deal with OilPrice.com to feature original geopolitical news articles and information for global distribution to international newspapers, wire services, energy and financial sector news sites and other global publication outlets.
http://www.oilprice.com/articles-geopolitics.php
October 20, 2009
Open Source Intelligence Use Soars
http://www.dodbuzz.com/2009/10/20/open-source-intel-use-soars/
September 21, 2009
The OSINT Group was featured on the National Public Radio broadcast of "political intelligence" issues between Wall Street and Congress.
http://marketplace.publicradio.org/display/web/2009/09/17/pm-inside-dope/
May 2009
The OSINT Group was featured in the May 2009 Q&A interview with Singapore-based Eureka Hedge:
Two excellent articles on the "paradigm shift" from Wall Street to Washington and illustrating why clients in the hedge fund, private equity, energy and defense sectors are contacting The OSINT Group:
http://pac.org/blog/maybe-we-should-open-a-washington-office
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/09/12/AR2009091202932_pf.html
Every day in Washington and within government institutions across the globe, decisions are made that affect the prospects and profitability of individual companies and entire industries. The investment and political worlds are both in the midst of a sea change. Higher levels of regulation are in the works, no matter which party is in control.
The forces driving these changes – the political contests and policy debates – are not as familiar to investment professionals as fundamental, technical or quantitative research. The task of tracking, analyzing and anticipating impactful shifts in public policy is not an academic exercise.
When you need to understand policy and politics accurately and consistently, we take the guesswork out of your analysis. Top corporations and foreign governments set a very high standard for the outside counsel they retain for managing risk and unearthing new opportunities. We provide experts of that caliber who—instead of trying to change policy—are able to help you understand and stay ahead of it.
Our "Political Intelligence" service is built on a single powerful idea: to provide institutional investors with accurate, actionable and timely information created by the currents of political forces and regulatory decisions.
Wall Street Firms, Hedge Funds, Recruit CIA, Ex-Military Intelligence
"Analysts must be able to find, access and share information, analytic
judgments and each other in any media and in real time."
Intelligence Community Directive (ICD) 200
