@Cosmichomicide I've tracked extremists for the better part of a decade and the influence operation targeting campuses to support these viewpoints is disturbing. This is just one source. Web Ops is another. And I'm not going to get into the details of how that stuff works. Where did I say most? I said many.

You have to start somewhere. On the training side of my business, my first OSINT class had two people in it. Today, I train federal law enforcement, military units, and major companies in the private sector for the U.S. our allies and partners.

Many of these college kids see America as an "imperialist aggressor" and Hamas as "freedom fighters." I've had several civil conversations with them and they like to say well what if the history on Hamas is wrong and we aren't being told the whole story. That is part of what we are dealing with here.

The China threat isn't just real for Taiwan, Hong Kong, or the Uyghurs. The Chinese Communist Party sets up front groups and front organizations every single week in the United States, targeting political dissidents, our technology and trade secrets, and trying to undermine our security and democracy. Not a conspiracy. A fact.

The U.S. has made its share of terrible choices that have impacted generations of minorities. But if you think for one second I want Russia or China to fill our spot on the world stage, you have lost your damn mind.

It isn't a surprise that many college kids support Hamas. They use platforms like TikTok, which are rife with disinformation, are primarily taught the bad things about what Western nations did, aren't given any boundaries, and quite honestly can't handle the least amount of criticism. It makes them very easy targets for propaganda campaigns.

Is anyone on COSO interested in learning OSINT? For background: I teach this intelligence discipline to people in the public and private sectors. This would be a fundamentals class, teaching you how to research more effectively, analyze sources, filter through disinformation, trace it to its source, etc.

It’s a step in the right direction with the threats we face today. And one can hope that it ends up turning into a trend.

Xi, Putin, Khamenei and other aspiring authoritarians would sure hate to see that. And America would be stronger and better because of it.

I’m grateful the House approved the aid bill to Ukraine, Israel, and Taiwan.

The Chinese, Russian, and Iranian state present the most significant threat to peace and security globally.

The approval of the aid bill doesn’t only show Ukraine, Israel, and Taiwan that the U.S. is a reliable partner and friend. It also sends a message to Xi, Putin, and Khamenei that America still stands up to dictators and won’t let their power go unchecked.

COSO how goes it today?

These are just a few of the real world use cases that we go through in the OSINT Risk Intelligence Course this April, and we teach the methodology and techniques to find this type of stuff on your own.

We still have a few open spots for this training.

Want more information?

Feel free to reach out.

3️⃣ A Russian Telegram group where members of it are selling arms to Russians fighting in Ukraine.

4️⃣ A website for a company where nothing looks off at first, but after some digging, you find out the entire business is generated by AI-imagery and text created by ChatGPT or some other LLM.

5️⃣ A private group on social media with a boring title that initially wouldn't trigger any concerns but after some investigation it turns out they are selling products that violate export laws.

Here are five examples of things of unique things you can find with open-source intelligence when you begin to connect data points. 👇

1️⃣ A Facebook profile that at first looks like there isn't much intelligence value to it, but after some digging, you find out it's connected to a state actor.

2️⃣ An Instagram account with an unusual alias for someone with a military background who shows patterns that indicate he wants to join a sanctioned criminal organization abroad.

This evening, my wife asked me to grab her a cream soda, and I struggled with this basic task.

It was one of those moments where your autopilot just can't seem to work.

So I go to the fridge and open the door. Then, I make eye contact with the cream soda and reach for it.

At least, I thought that's what I did.

What did I get her instead?

A nice refreshing bottle of barbecue sauce.

What's up COSO? How is everyone?

I was talking to a friend in Iran tonight. We have been friends for several years. Tonight, he sent me a video from his balcony of the missiles going through the air. There were too many details in the video that if I shared it, it would be easy to geolocate him and his safety is paramount, but yeah, seeing the video was WOW.

There are a lot of Iranians in Iran that hate the regime. I know because I know several of them. But if missiles reign down on those people's homes at any time in the future with where this conflict may go, killing family or friends, they will happily fight for the regime against Israel.

Throughout history, many aspiring dictators and extremists have revealed hints and clues as to their true intentions, and more often than not, the free world ignores such patterns until it has to pay severe consequences.

But he was attacking Israel and the U.S. in his sermons as early as the 1960s and aiming for change decades before the Iranian Revolution.

For example, in 1943, before he was a well-known name worldwide, he published Kashf al-Asrar. In it, he proposed rising up to create an Islamic government and his deep opposition to any anti-religious path.

This statement tells us a lot about the type of belief system that has ruled Iran for 45 years.

Hezbollah wasn't founded until 1982. But in 1979, Khomeini was saying the Iranian government would support all Islamic struggles against Israel.

Is it any wonder that the Iranian state has so many proxies?

Khomeini was also the first world leader to call the United States "The Great Satan" and "Israel, Little Satan."