Corporate Intelligence Awareness

Publication Discussion - Ludicrous? Spying on the supposedly security conscious!

Fri, 3 Feb 2012 15:57:00 GMT

It is interesting to note that even the most security conscious (supposedly) ignore the deployment of readily available technology that enables any open media connection to be overheard/tapped/hacked.

This interesting article and clip reveals a situation where “FBI and Scotland Yard investigators recently plotting a strategy for tracking suspects linked to Anonymous, little did they know that members of the group were eavesdropping on their conference call and recording their plans.”

In the age of digital convergance, how aware of we of our own vulnerability as we unwittingly reveal corporate details while chatting, blogging, Tweeting, talking…? Governments around the world have as good as admitted they listen to all communication traffic available!

http://www.wired.com/threatlevel/2012/02/anonymous-scotland-yard/

- Year-end Message from Rodger Harding

Tue, 6 Dec 2011 16:47:18 GMT

Dear Clients & Friends,

With a strong finish to 2011, I am enthusiastically preparing for my annual vacation. The office will be closed from 7th December 2011- 2 January 2012.

It was gratifying to see Workplace Happiness as a recurring theme in client interaction this year. It would appear that the term happiness has graduated from a warm and fuzzy term to a priority in securing full team engagement.

As the Holiday Season is drawing near, I thought to share my 3 (decades old, yet still hard to practice) cumulative exercises to achieve personal/professional happiness:

• Practice active Gratitude: Bring mundane fortune to conscious awareness. Good examples are the presence of electricity; running water; a flushing toilet; a successful computer boot-up; a call from a friend; working limbs/good health; a vehicle that starts - What would our day look like if one or more of these items were not present?

• Celebrate Individuality: We are so often tempted to compare ourselves with others – Constant marketing and social pressure does not make it easy to be content with who we are and what we have.

Most days I force myself to recall the well known line from Desiderata: “There will always be greater and lesser persons than yourself!” Accepting that reality, allows me to experience moments of real pride in my life achievement. My own insignificance in the grand scheme of things sets me free…

• Get off centre stage: So often we place ourselves squarely in the middle of situations. Especially in difficult times we feel that the world is out to get us…Realizing that the bigger picture is not always evident - Applying exercises 1 & 2 will ensure our ability to be accepting of randomness, chance and the wild-card factor.

Oftentimes the ability to surrender to perceived unfairness and situations/people that are difficult to digest helps me move on, and live with less stress than in earlier years.

I am ever grateful for the dozens of people who have contributed in so many ways to the success of my business – There is no way I could have survived without your support! This especially true as I have endeavored to match my own vision with like-minded clients over the past 14 years of operation.

My best wishes to you all for the Holidays … And a safe, healthy and prosperous 2012!

I look forward to renewed contact in the New Year.

Warm regards,

Rodger

- The Bob Dechert Espionage Saga - Vigilance vs Paranoia

Fri, 16 Sep 2011 16:35:36 GMT

For citizens of a major economic and political power it is surprising how naïve we can be.

Spying has and will always be part of the landscape as long as human competition exists. Creative minds share ideas, exchange information & invent stuff, while others pilfer the results.

Just think how often people (ourselves included) steal from websites, copy designs and download material/information, all identified, researched, analyzed and produced by others … At no cost…and certainly with no pangs of conscience!

Yet even at government level it is startling to notice that people happily assume they are somehow inviolate as intelligence targets! Just as we North Americans stole and copied so diligently from the Europeans, so too, emerging economies are hell bent on gaining the competitive edge at any cost. We make/made it easy with outsourcing, by inviting foreign teams to spend times in our operational environments and by talking too much to close deals. The notion of being somehow in total control of our destinies is perhaps the culprit?

Are we truly aware of what information walks out the door? The solution does not lie in legislation, process, security checks alone; nor in assuming the validity of our own moral code, but rather in the ongoing awareness/vigilance of individuals, teams, organizations and governments as to the economic danger posed by exposure to prying eyes.

In my regular courses on Corporate Intelligence Awareness, I encounter many individuals who persist in equating vigilance with paranoia!

http://www.montrealgazette.com/news/Stepen+Hunter+Dechert +scandal+shows+Canada+listening/5404809/story.html

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/politics/tory-mp-who-flirted-with-chinese-reporter-passed-security-check/article2162968/

- Intelligence Gathering & Reflection

Sat, 27 Aug 2011 13:30:46 GMT

''Bushmen refer to Tapping within themselves - A physical manifestation of a profound gift for intuitive apprehension of the future … Only a fool would go on ignoring his tapping…if he does not sit and listen to his tapping it could utterly leave him" - Laurens van der Post (A Far-Off Place)

Creative or visionary leaders need time to reflect - To listen to an inner voice that interprets countless bits of information that have set off alarm bells in the sub-conscious mind...!

Just as a computer has hidden files, cookies, meta-tags, temporary files etc. so the human brain has the capacity to search, filter and analyze its own data base while consciously engaged in other activity. Just as the computer contains a large amount of unused or underutilized functions, the human capacity for research and solution providing may remain untapped. Circumstance may provide an adrenaline rush that will necessitate blind reliance on intuition. Consider the advantage of being able to confidently and consciously engage this resource through taking the time to regularly reflect on diverse items of stimulating information !

"Creativity is about finding, discovery, and making the link between what you've seen and are trying to achieve…you can’t find if you're looking - It's a process of osmosis that is dependent on being in a relaxed state of mind… Creatives need time to stroll and come upon things. We're idea merchants…If you are not fascinated, you simply do not find things … It's about finding visual stimuli and translating them into stunning creative concepts." Sean Harrison, Creative Director, Code

- Intelligence & Discretion - A Canadian Example!

Sat, 27 Aug 2011 13:12:54 GMT

That Ontario based Bayly Communications went into receivership last month did not really make headlines. Yet the possible demise of this company, formerly Bayly Engineering, is significant as it marks the disappearance of the last vestige of an illustrious Canadian.

Founder, Benjamin De Forest (Pat) Bayly, the largely unknown Canadian hero of WWII whose brilliant encryption/decryption work saved countless lives and gave the Allies an unquestioned competitive edge, maintained the point of view that he should never be known by name. He refused to write up an account of his secret intelligence activities after the war saying:

"… the best thing I could do was shut up ..."

"I wasn’t having any of that, because I had been treated extremely well by Canada, the States and England - far beyond what was necessary. I was welcomed into places where it was absolutely necessary that I be … and everybody's been so very kind. … We'd go out and have a couple of drinks and they'd tell me political things that shouldn’t be free, … they were really quite outspoken and I came to the conclusion at the end of the war that the best thing I could do was shut up. Because if I did, if I spoke all the things I would unwittingly mention, things would have political (consequences)…."

Quoted in The True Intrepid by Bill Macdonald (RAINCOAST Books)

Bayly’s standpoint meant that he placed the greater picture ahead of his personal desire for recognition – The critical discretion of a truly service-oriented leader!