Title: Supporting reasoning and communication for intelligence officers

Authors: Claus Atzenbeck, David L. Hicks, Nasrullah Memon

Addresses: Collaborative Technologies and Systems, Faculty of Media Engineering and Technology, German University in Cairo, Al Tagamoa Al Khames, New Cairo, Egypt. ' Esbjerg Institute of Technology, Aalborg University, Niels Bohrs Vej 8, 6700 Esbjerg, Denmark. ' The Maersk Mc-Kinney Moller Institute, University of Southern Denmark, Campusvej 55, 5230 Odense M, Denmark

Abstract: Based on the emergent nature of terrorist groups, we propose a spatial hypertext as a tool for intelligence analysts for representing, reasoning upon and communicating information. Furthermore, we evaluate awareness as an important feature for analysts to realise hidden associations between various people or objects. We also evaluate and discuss versioning, which plays an important role for knowledge workers, including intelligence officers, especially in collaborative work environments. Finally, we discuss our prototype Socs, a general spatial structure application with high-level support for awareness, under the umbrella of intelligence analysis requirements.

Keywords: intelligence analysis; emergent structures; awareness; communication; versioning; time representation; knowledge representation; reasoning; collaboration; intelligence officers; terrorists; terrorism; spatial hypertext; analysts; information support; hidden associations; knowledge workers; collaborative work environments; Socs; networks; virtual organisations; web based organisations; online organisations; open source intelligence; web mining; world wide web; internet.

DOI: 10.1504/IJNVO.2011.037159

International Journal of Networking and Virtual Organisations, 2011 Vol.8 No.1/2, pp.15 - 36

Published online: 21 Feb 2015 *

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