(fwd) More on CIA's Internet Debut

[kelly@netcom.com (Kelly Goen)]

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From: nyt@blythe.org (NY Transfer News)
Newsgroups: alt.conspiracy
Subject: More on CIA's Internet Debut
Keywords: pigs in the wire
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Date: Sun, 26 Sep 93 20:35:32 EDT
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/* Written  1:24 am  Sep 27, 1993 by cwarren@peg.apc.org in igc:gen.bigbro */
/* ---------- "CIA, watching, watching, watching" ---------- */


Topic 189       CIA, INTERNET - TRUE!   Response  2 of  3 agarton
cafe.australia   9:00 am  Sep 24, 1993

Internet From: <dlr@well.sf.ca.us> To: dlr@netcom.com Date:
Wed, 22 Sep 1993

Found the following on the Well and thought it may be of
interest.

*****************************************************************

The following appears in the premier issue of "The Internet
Letter."  I'm not sure what exactly is meant in the third
paragraph--it seems a bit garbled.   Paul Wallner is actually the
coordinator of the Intelligence Community's efforts on "open
source" (unclassified information useful to intelligence analysts,
etc.), and not just CIA's--technically he works for the Director
of Central Intelligence in his role as IC coordinator.

The Internet Letter is edited by Jayne Levin, and is apparently
premiering at Inet'93.
***************************************************************************


004) CIA, U.S. GOVERNMENT INTELLIGENCE AGENCIES DEVELOP INTERNET
LINK

	Fourteen U.S. government intelligence agencies, led by the
Central Intelligence Agency, are developing plans that would allow
them to share unclassified information via the Internet.
	"Everyone is using it [the Internet]," said Paul Wallner,
CIA Intelligence Community Open Source coordinator, in an
exclusive interview with The Internet Letter. "Why not take
advantage of it ourselves and use it.
	"We're not looking at the Internet as a way to gather
intelligence," Wallner said. "The Internet is not viewed as a
source of information for us."
	The agencies that would use Internet to exchange "public"
information are part of the National Foreign Intelligence program.
They include the National Security Agency, CIA and the Defense
Intelligence Agency.
	The intelligence community will use the Internet to share
information and ideas among themselves and the academic community,
Wallner said. For example, if the CIA were asked about the nuclear
waste problem in Russia, "a good way" to find out would be to talk
to the scientific community on the Internet, he said.
	The system in place now is inadequate. While each agency
has its own internal electronic communications network, two
intelligence analysts working at different agencies but on the
same project cannot send E-mail to one another. There also are no
electronic links between the intelligence and academic
communities. Communication is carried out mostly by telephone.
	 Because of security concerns, the internal community
network will not be connected directly to the Internet, Wallner
said. The CIA plans to address the issue of security by creating
"air gaps" between classified and unclassified information. An air
gap would create a physical space between an agency's internal
network and an Internet link.
	"That allows us to have another check on hackers and
potential viruses," Wallner said. He characterized the tone of the
discussion over security as "technical."
	There are three phases to the project, and the first phase
is expected to start next spring. It involves establishing nine
prototype Internet "nodes" that will connect to an Internet
backbone. The CIA plans to seek engineering support from private
industry to help design the network's overall architecture.
	Unclassified materials produced by the Foreign Broadcast
Information Service (FBIS) may be available for anonymous FTP
(file transfer protocol). No decision has been made on whether a
Gopher or WAIS (Wide Area Information Server) server will be used,
Wallner said.
	The government is grappling with whether public
distribution of FBIS publications via the Internet would violate
copyright law. Selected FBIS publications now are available in
print and microfiche to government agencies and universities. FBIS
publishes eight daily reports, one for each geographic region of
the world.
	The information is gleaned from news accounts,
commentaries and government statements from foreign broadcasts,
and it is translated into English from more than 80 languages.
---------------------

Big brother is here and watching :)


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