BBC Monitoring
From Free net encyclopedia
BBC Monitoring is a division of the British Broadcasting Corporation that monitors the mass media worldwide and acts as the British Government's provider of open source intelligence (OSINT). It is based in Caversham, near Reading in southern England, and selects and translates information from radio, television, press, news agencies and the Internet from 150 countries in more than 70 languages. It has overseas offices in Moscow, Nairobi, Kiev, Baku and Tashkent.
Although nominally and administratively part of the BBC, BBC Monitoring does not receive any licence fee money and is instead funded directly by its stakeholders as well as by subscriptions from official and commercial bodies throughout the world. Customers for BBC Monitoring's services include the Foreign and Commonwealth Office, the Defence Intelligence Staff, and other government bodies and intelligence agencies.
BBC Monitoring shares the task of global OSINT collection with its US counterpart, the Foreign Broadcast Information Service, now known as the Open Source Center, a division of the Central Intelligence Agency. Information gathered is pooled under an intelligence sharing agreement dating from 1946, and is made available to a number of governments worldwide via the Open Source Information System (OSIS).
History of BBC Monitoring
The organisation was formed in 1939 to provide the British Government access to foreign media and propaganda. It provided the government with valuable information during World War II, particularly in places where foreign journalists are banned. The organisation played an important role in helping observers keep track of developments during the Cold War, the disintegration of the Iron Curtain and collapse of the Soviet Union. Also monitored were the Yugoslav wars and the Middle East. At the moment it plays a key role in providing the UK and US governments with information on, but not just: Iraq, Afghanistan, North Korea and other trouble spots.