Open-Source Intelligence in Latin America

This chapter explores the development and ambivalence of Open-Source Intelligence (OSINT), with a focus on Latin America. OSINT is defined as a systematic method of collecting and analysing publicly available data to reconstruct events, particularly where information is incomplete or contested. While widely developed in Western contexts, it remains understudied elsewhere. Historically, OSINT predates the digital age, evolving from early modern information networks to twentieth-century media monitoring institutions. Digital technologies have since expanded its scale, incorporating satellite imagery, social media, and open databases. Today, OSINT extends beyond intelligence agencies into journalism, academia, NGOs, and civic practices. A central argument is that OSINT functions as a “pharmakon”: it can both support democratic accountability and enable manipulation. While it allows citizens and journalists to document violence and hold power accountable, it can also be misused through “dark OSINT”, where its evidential aesthetics are imitated to spread disinformation or conduct surveillance. In Latin America, OSINT draws on a longer tradition of forensic and civic investigation, particularly in documenting state violence. Contemporary initiatives use it to map crime, monitor environmental change, and produce alternative data. At the same time, these practices reveal tensions between empowerment and control. The chapter ultimately positions OSINT as both an object of study and a methodological tool, particularly through digital fieldwork and the analysis of the datasphere.

Allan Deneuville. Open-Source Intelligence in Latin America. The Palgrave Handbook of Digital Latin American Studies, Palgrave Macmillan, 2026, 978-3-031-77500-0. ⟨hal-05731466⟩ (lien externe)