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Intellipedia, the dynamic cross-agency repository of intelligence information, celebrated its second anniversary this year.  Functioning much like the familiar Wikipedia online encyclopedia program, Intellipedia helps Department of Defense, CIA, FBI, and other intelligence agencies search for and contribute to subjects concerning US security issues.  Intellipedia is a revolutionary tool which marks a paradigm shift of earthquake proportions in an area previously known to move at the speed of continental drift.  Industry analysts are quick to point out that while Intellipedia is an invaluable tool, it is more amazing as an indicator of intelligence sharing initiatives taken by security agencies to address threats and respond to them in a more timely fashion.

Historically, intelligence gathering and information sharing between government agencies was notoriously guarded.  The “need to know” mantra which many operatives lived and died by, led to information hoarding.  As outlined in congressional investigations following the September 11th attacks and inquiries into the Iraq war, failure to share vital pieces of information to create a better understanding of developing threats among various institutions led to missed opportunities or incorrect assessments.  The old method of sharing information via files, e-mail, and Powerpoint presentations was not able to handle the speed at which imminently developing situations were evolving.  Even worse, the leadership philosophy of claiming the “win” in breaking a case kept national interests hostage to departmental pride.  As a result of congressional pressure and evident tragedy, these old ways of doing business had to change. 

That change was first discussed by Calvin Andrus in his essay, “The Wiki and the Blog: Toward a Complex Adaptive Intelligence Community”.  The paper was driven as a call to arms by the CIA to any intelligence agent in any intelligence agency to expound upon means of better information sharing.  Andrus argued that the technology exploited by Wikipedia and bloggers would help to solve information bottlenecks and blind spots.  The U.S. Government agreed. 

In 2006, Intellipedia was born.  With Google providing servers and software for the wiki, Intellipedia offers a similar look and feel that most up-and-coming intelligence agents, generation Y folks, are comfortable using.  Intellipedia has an eBay like quality in that it allows readers to rate contributors.  Deputy Director of National Intelligence Thomas Fingar stated that he hoped Intellipedia would reward analysts whose judgments most often turned out to be correct. However, if people were continuously making bad contributions, that would be tracked, as well.  Andrus’ inital arguments are validated in the current estimates, reported on Wikipedia, which declare “As of March 2008, Intellipedia hosted 35,000 articles (making a total of 200,000 pages) edited by 37,000 users. The system has been enhanced to include a YouTube-like video channel, a Flickr-like photo sharing feature, content tagging, blogs and RSS feeds.”

Early on, valued contributors to Intellipedia were rewarded with black powder-coated trowels for their exceptional contributions, perhaps a tongue-in-cheek jab at powder-coated blades usually awarded to special ops soldiers for outstanding performance.  Quirky things like this can help cement a tool and its philosophy into an organization’s culture.  Certainly, having managers build into an employee’s performance plan a way of weighting quality and quantity of Intellipedia contributions gives the new paradigm even more weight as “the way we do business”.

That’s not to say that Intellipedia is the silver bullet to the congressional report findings.  As Tom Davenport of the Harvard Business Review reported, “At the recent Enterprise 2.0 conference in Boston, some intelligence people who are working with Intellipedia said that only 10% of the eligible user population is actually using it, and that middle management isn’t comfortable with it. Of course, they probably need to get comfortable with tools like Intellipedia, but the mere existence of the tool isn’t going to make that happen.”  For example, just buying a central air unit will not keep a house cool in the summertime.  It must be installed, along with interconnecting vents, and receive scheduled maintenance in order to function properly.  So, too, must leadership make sure that philosophy Intellipedia embodies is supported in order to achieve the desired results of decision making superiority.

Chris Rasmussen, Knowledge Management Officer, Intellipedia, gave a presentation at the Spring Government CIO Conference in Ft. Myers, FL which hit on some key points to improve the intelligence community.  Rasmussen argued, “Something that’s 80% accurate, on time, and sharable is better than something that is too much, perfectly formatted, too late, and over-classified”.  This reaffirmed the importance of immediate contributions through Intellipedia versus the standard, classified Powerpoint presentations.  He also blasted the importance of information over department loyalties by hammering, “We want your knowledge not your agency seal”.

Intellipedia is a great first step for national security.  As an anonymous user of Intellipedia told Talkibie, “Intellipedia, I feel, is just a neat tool.  There is a lot of information on the site but there are other web locations that are just as good if not better. As information becomes more available the web itself becomes more valuable.”  It appears that other agencies would agree as programs such as the FBI’s IntraGuard, the DoD’s Biometric Fusion Center, and the multi-department developed Automated Biometric Information System are assisting in tracking and sharing information in the hopes of nipping terrorist acts in the bud.  In the future, those seeking to attack others will find themselves caught by agents that know how to spin information better thanks to Web 2.0.

Monday, June 30th, 2008 You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.

By Alicen Hogan