Research

Research Inspired by the Intel Cycle

The Typical Intel Cycle inspires organizing and conducting general research. This article outlines the four main steps of research inspired by the Cycle and provides recommendations for websites and tools to assist in each stage.

Are you starting your path to improving your research skills, especially after completing open-source research training or courses? See this community guide for ways to begin: Community Recommended Pathways/Research

Research Resources

1. National_Strategy_and_Reports
2. Plan and Prepare
   1. DFP for Research

• Containers for Research|

1. Research Planning Guide
2. Structured Analytic Techniques (SATs)
3. PMESII-PT
4. Center of Gravity (COG) Analysis
5. Research Templates

1. Gather
   1. Research Datasets
   2. Darkweb Links
   3. Research Tools
   4. Leaks and Compilations
   5. Citation
   6. ai-prompting for advanced queries

1. Process and Analyze
   1. Forms for Processing
   2. R Studio Guide

Research Guides

• OSINT in 5 Hours

Planning For Research

Proper planning is crucial to ensure the success of any research project. This phase involves identifying the research question or problem, formulating a hypothesis, and establishing a clear and focused research objective. This guide also includes setting up systems, networks, accounts, and devices.

See the Research Planning Guide section for a full guide.

Recommended Research Planning Resources

• Goldilocker Tool: For refining research questions in a guided approach
• ROOBRICK: A collaborative way to do COG Analysis with others while maintaining each planning session for knowledge management. Weights are customizable and go from 0 (lowest) to 1 (highest)
• Mendeley: For organizing and managing references and research materials.
• Draw.io / Diagrams.net: Create mind maps to help visualize and structure your research ideas. It does not require a login.

Gathering Data

Data collection is the next step in the research process. Researchers gather relevant information from various sources.

Recommended Data Collection Resources

• Elicit: Uses language models to help you automate research workflows, such as parts of the literature review. It can find relevant papers without perfect keyword matches, summarize takeaways from the papers specific to your question, and extract key information from the papers.
• PAI-Dashboard: One-stop shop for current events, foreign policy analysis, & military news for awareness
• Research Datasets: An evergreen list of datasets for research. This is not just a list of social media links but aims to provide metrics.
• Research Platforms: An evergreen list of platforms for research, specifically for gathering data.
• If your research takes you into the DarkWeb and requires gathering data on .onion websites, then check out Darkweb Links
• WorldCat: A global catalog of library collections that helps find books, articles, and other research materials.
• Google Dataset Search: For discovering publicly available datasets.
• JSTOR: A digital library of academic journals, books, and primary sources.

Processing Data

Once the data has been collected, it must be processed and organized for further analysis.

Recommended Data Processing Resources

• Cryptpad: For organizing and processing spreadsheet data - while being E2EE and not requiring a login
• Microsoft Excel: For organizing and processing spreadsheet data.
• OSINTCombine: Process and visualize data from a local CSV file on the web without any 3rd party add-ons
• OpenRefine: For cleaning and transforming messy data.
• RStudio: For statistical computing and graphics, particularly useful for data analysis and visualization.
  • RStudio Guide

Example Workflow: Building Your Own Archive

See Archival Research for more context

1. Took 27k pictures of sources
   1. Sorted with exifTool by timestamp
   2. OCR
2. Tools
   1. HTTrack
   2. Forensic OSINT
   3. Hunchly
   4. Zotero
3. Deleted Tweets
   1. Find the account
   2. Wayback Machine Downloader
4. DocFetcher to create a searchable index of a directory

Analyzing Data

This step involves examining the processed data to identify patterns, trends, and relationships.

Recommended Data Analysis Resources

• Gephi Guide (Login Required): This is for visualizing and exploring complex networks.
  • Gephi: For visualizing and exploring complex networks.
• RStudio Guide (Login Required): For statistical computing and graphics, particularly useful for data analysis and visualization.
  • RStudio: For statistical computing and graphics, particularly useful for data analysis and visualization.
• AlternativeTo Sections: Section with multiple tools rated by the community.
  • Data Visualization
  • GeoSpatial Analysis: Geospatial analysis tools
• Tableau: For creating interactive and shareable data visualizations.
• NVivo: For analyzing qualitative data, such as text, images, and videos.

By following these steps and utilizing the recommended websites and tools, researchers can effectively conduct research inspired by the Typical Intel Cycle.

Research Reporting and Dissemination

The final step in the research process involves reporting and disseminating the findings. This phase includes preparing research reports, presenting findings, and sharing insights with relevant stakeholders. Ensure the hypothesis is tested, and the results are presented clearly and concisely.

Recommended Research Report Resources

• Overleaf: For writing and collaborating on research papers and reports.