Open Source Solutions, 11005 Langton Arms Court, Oakton VA 22043-1735, Tel: 703-242-1700, Fax: 703-242-1711, Internet: oss@oss.net Third Annual Symposium on "National Security and National Competitiveness," Alexandria, Virginia, November 8-10, 1994. Speaker Biographies.

For years now, Robert D. Steele has been spreading his gospel of "open source intelligence," with stunning success. His annual intelligence symposiums bring together KGB colonels, corporate leaders, CIA officers, and legendary hackers, all in apparent amity. In addition to intelligence types, Steele's first such symposium featured addresses by information gurus Mitch Kapor and John Perry Barlow. Steele's most recent symposium, held in the Washington DC area in November of 1994, was addressed by, among others, Stewart Brand (founder of The Well) and Emmanuel Goldstein (since 1984, publisher of the cult hacker publication, "2600 Magazine").

Steele is now setting up a prototype operation that will specialize in online research for the benefit of private clients with deep pockets. "If you are a potential client of Steele's," says Olivier Schmidt, the founding editor of Intelligence Newsletter in Paris, "you should nevertheless do your own intelligence legwork to see if your current or future adversaries are also Steele's clients." When applied to competitiveness in the private sector, it seems that the philosophy of "open source intelligence" soon generates its own contradictions.

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