Deploying OSINT in armed conflict settings: law, ethics, and the need for a new theory of harm

ICRC Humanitarian Law and Policy Blog · Dec 5, 2023 · 17m

The deployment of open-source intelligence, or OSINT – information gathered from publicly-available data sources and used for intelligence purposes – is having a dramatic impact on armed conflict in the 21st century, rebalancing information asymmetries between states and other actors while supporting accountability efforts. There is, however, a downside to these developments, with OSINT creating and enabling the risk of harm to civilians’ rights, lives, and safety in ways that are not yet fully understood. In this post, part of a new series on Cybersecurity and data protection in humanitarian…