Artifact Details
FBIS used this Russian atlas as a geographic reference to validate and inform open source reporting.
This Russian atlas was procured by the Foreign Broadcast Information Service (FBIS) Map Services Center in the 1990s to use as a geographic reference to validate and inform open source reporting.
Since 1941, an organization dedicated to the collection and exploitation of open sources has helped policymakers understand our adversaries and the world around us. FBIS originally monitored foreign shortwave radio as part of the Federal Communications Commission and contributed valuable information gleaned from the airwaves to customers in the Office of Strategic Services and the U.S. Departments of State, War, and Navy during World War II.
In 1946, FBIS became a founding element of the new Central Intelligence Group. The National Security Council tasked the Director of Central Intelligence to operate FBIS as a service of common concern, specifically “to conduct all Federal monitoring of foreign propaganda and press broadcasts required for the collection of intelligence information to meet the needs of all Departments and Agencies in connection with National Security.”
In 2005, FBIS became the Open Source Center, and in 2015, the Open Source Enterprise, which it is still known as today. The value of open source intelligence continues unabated with the expansion of openly available information and communication media centered on computer technology and the internet.