Michael Tanji, writing both at his website and Wired’s Danger Room, discusses the benefits of open-source intelligence compared to the more traditional, secret sorts of things we think of when we use the term “intelligence”. The case he makes is a good one, but I have to object to part of his article.
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An interesting newspaper article yesterday, on what it’s like to be a surveillance specialist for Britain’s MI5. The recruitment process seems to compare very favorably with the rigamarole the American security services put you through - but maybe they’re just glossing over the full-on background checks, the lie-detector exams, and so on. Still, 25K GBP starting salary is nothing to sneeze at.

For my part, I’ve had a few of those job interviews where you have no idea what position you’re applying for - but that’s mainly been the fault of “human resources” people with no clue about computers interviewing others for IT positions. Mmm, bureaucracy…