The purpose of collecting this kind of intelligence is to provide other types of intelligence with crucial context, resulting in a thorough situational awareness report that can be used to guide decisions at any stage of operations.
OSINT is gathered from a variety of sources, including websites, social media, radio, print, and electronic records. The biggest challenges for the defence and security industries when it comes to open-source intelligence are the volume of information produced every minute as well as its relevance and accuracy. Nowadays, skilled analysts must sort through millions of brand-new pieces of content every day, including messages, tweets, and webpages on social media and broadcast media. More than 180 zettabytes of data will be produced, copied, and used globally over the course of the next five years, predicts Statista (1).
Gathering intelligence from open sources is a challenging, time-consuming, and expensive job due to the large number of open sources that expand, change, or phase out every year. This is the reason why machine learning, artificial intelligence, and big data analytics have revolutionised the market for OSINT products in recent years. These new technologies have changed how open-source data is gathered, opening up new business possibilities for solution providers who can provide scalable systems that speed up OSINT workflows for governmental, military, and civilian users alike.
The European company Hensoldt Analytics, which creates industry-leading products and components, is a major participant in the OSINT industry worldwide. A comprehensive end-to-end OSINT system, the Media Mining System automates the gathering, harvesting, and analysis of image and text data from various sources, including video and speech, in 35 languages and dialects. Hensoldt’s offering can keep an eye on print media, the web, social media, digital satellite radio and TV, FM radio, podcasts, emails, documents, and messaging apps (like Telegram), providing thorough coverage of the open sources you’ve chosen. Users can plug in their own data streams, make custom profiles, and create ontologies to filter out irrelevant data and improve query matching in addition to selecting which information to send into the system.
The Media Mining System was created to help data analysts at all phases of the open-source intelligence-gathering process, including the collaborative environment for decision-makers and analysts for the quick and easy sharing of information. The system improves the accuracy and effectiveness of investigative work by completely automating the 24/7 or scheduled recording of data from multiple sources, indexing and archiving, complex data and trend visualizing, custom reporting and disseminating.
The product from Hensoldt is designed for both long-term operations and short-term OSINT collection initiatives (such as election monitoring, emergency situations, and catastrophe relief efforts). Integrations with current SIGINT and IMINT tools and services, for instance, can improve the native powers of these systems. The solution is simple to set up, extend, and update, and data is kept on servers that are typically installed on-site for easy access.
The product from Hensldt Analytics has a competitive edge due to its adaptability and flexibility. Defense and security experts now have the chance to construct a system that genuinely meets their operational needs thanks to the customizability and on-demand feature possibilities. In order to address the difficulties of gathering intelligence in data-rich environments, the internal development, computer vision, and research departments located in Austria and Germany work to expand the proprietary technologies at the core of the Media Mining System.
Computer vision technology is used by one of the newly enhanced components, ODCT, to enable object detection, tracking, and classification in real-time videos. The new features make it simple for our customers to expand on the Media Mining System’s various options, pick the skills they need, and quicken both their small- and large-scale open-source gathering operations.
Hensoldt Analytics is dedicated to developing client-centered products that give OSINT analysts and decision-makers useful information. The Media Mining System gives its users a real edge in a world where data is one of the most valuable currencies by combining the power of Natural Language Processing, Automatic Speech Recognition, Computer Vision, AI, and Machine Learning.
