Rajesh Pant, Chairman of the Cyber Security Association of India, recently spoke at a session of the National Security Dialogue about intelligence gathering in the intelligent age and the developments of Artificial Intelligence, quantum computing, cyber security, and more. He further added that these technologies must be introduced as they become available for intelligence agencies to leverage them strategically to enhance and improve their operations and decisions.

The evolution in technology has fundamentally changed the manner of conducting intelligence operations. Traditionally, as per Moore's Law, processing power was doubling every 18 months, but this cycle has now accelerated to six months. The growth in artificial intelligence and its applications is driving new tool and methodology development. To effectively adapt to the emerging new technologies, a shift in mindset must occur at the leadership level.  A top-down approach should be directed at ensuring that the leaders are well aware of the benefits these technologies bring along. The components of such transformation are proper funding and an actionable plan. It needs to be structured and interdisciplinary in its innovation ecosystems. Innovation cells, dedicated to using new technologies within intelligence agencies, would be something that should be considered. Collaboration with academia, private tech firms, and startups can foster cutting-edge developments. Existing entities like NTRO and DRDO could collaborate on projects for agencies like the IB and RAW, streamlining efforts instead of each agency developing solutions independently. Agencies need to analyze the possible effects of technologies such as AI, biotechnology, quantum computing, and cyber security.

Red teaming exercises are conducted to explore the effective ways of using such technologies. The procurement processes need to be more agile to keep up with technological advancements. Furthermore, intelligence systems need to be modular, which means that they should be upgradable and integrated with legacy systems as technologies advance. There is also a need for up-skilling the existing people in AI, machine learning, data science, and cyber security. The government can also look at direct recruitment of specialists in these areas, thereby having a strong connection of talent to face emerging challenges. Initiatives like hackathons and open innovation challenges can be leveraged to tap into ideas from students, researchers, and the public for innovative solutions. Technological capabilities can be improved internationally by cooperation through bilateral and multilateral frameworks such as QUAD, BRICS, and SCO.

United States–India Initiative on Critical and Emerging Technology, or iCET is the best example of what may be achieved through cooperative effort in the address of critical technological advancements. Proactive, structured, and interdisciplinary leadership must propel initiatives that ensure the effectiveness of intelligence systems. Innovation, collaboration, and scalability will guarantee that intelligence agencies are better prepared to face current and future challenges. R&D supported through partnerships and emerging technologies is essential to this vision. By applying these measures, the intelligence operation will maximize technological innovations to ensure continued success in a highly changing environment.

Advancing Resource Management in Intelligence Strategies

A balanced approach has to be adopted for in-house development, with Public-Private Partnerships (PPP). The most remarkable one was three years ago when a Chinese company gathered data about around 50,000 people from the U.S., 10,000 from India, and other data from Australia, with a declaration on their portal for military operations. This incident highlights the ways, in which private agencies collect Open-Source Intelligence (OSINT), using more sophisticated tools such as web scraping, crawlers, and focused keywords that inspect the ocean of data to get accurate information. It is important to utilize existing in-house development with the resources effectively while collaborating with startups and established players to maximize the benefits of innovation and expertise.

Optimizing Decision Making through OSINT and TechINT 

This aspect, as a member of the National Security Council Secretariat, is to stress recent efforts towards drafting an overarching national security strategy. Indeed, an NSAB task force under Ambassador Raghavan, also chairperson of the National Security Advisory Board, has prepared an initial draft of the national security strategy. This draft is now with the NSCS, and it all depends on the timing to release this document; various considerations would go into its timing, politics being one of them. The government is indeed working on the strategy, rather than an assumption that it would not be considered a priority. A related important point is the advantages of a top-down decision-making approach. Often these are not readily apparent at the levels of leadership, but as the practice of using it could be shown to be effective such as the utilization of OSINT or TechINT, or in certain cases satellite imagery - it significantly increases the decision-making efficiency. These also gave actionable insights that in the past needed extensive man-hours.

Impact of Technology on Human Intelligence

Human Intelligence (HUMINT) is still an integral part of intelligence gathering. Beyond the traditional ways of obtaining HUMINT, open-source HUMINT has gained increasing attention. Open-source HUMINT encompasses gathering information from public sources, such as blogs, podcasts, and public speeches. For instance, recently a podcast in India, hosted people talking openly on the subject of interoperations and related topics. Open platforms become valuable sources of intelligence.  

Excelling Among Global Intelligence Agencies

India has one of the world's best intelligence systems. Like other countries, it keeps separate agencies for both internal and external intelligence. IB takes care of the internal intelligence, and RAW takes care of the external intelligence. This system is similar to the ones that are followed in other countries like the United States of America, where the FBI handles internal intelligence and the CIA manages external intelligence. The National Technical Research Organization is supplementary within India's intelligence framework. As a technical research agency, it provides support for intelligence operation activities, and through the powers provided by GapNet, conducts operations in the cyber domain.

Startups in OSINT and Intelligence Tech

Integrating startups with intelligence systems provides a technological innovation. For instance, regarding asset safety, tools such as the Tor browser and VPNs already exist for anonymization, though there is currently a trend toward creating a new set of technologies that fit into this context. Startups are involved in developing precise parts of these innovations. Within such an architecture, startups play by building parts of a large system, not knowing the greater purpose or end application of these parts. This also applies to OSINT, which involves various domains, including GEOINT and HUMINT. Some startups might be commissioned to address specific problems in OSINT, and the solutions are then connected to the greater framework of intelligence. In such a model, the best value from these innovative solutions would be added to and strengthened within intelligence operations.