The CIA "follows" Twitter and "like" Facebook. A dedicated social networking is becoming increasingly active.
At the start of the Cold War, a unit of the CIA was created specifically to follow the news and analyze the responses of populations due to different decisions in the world. This unit had been abandoned since the end of the war to resume service after the attacks of September 11, 2001. But this time, new information technologies pass primarily through the Internet, especially during the Green Revolution of Iran in 2009 where Twitter played a leading role in the uprising of the people. What has more recently confirmed with the Arab revolutions which social networks have become the tools.
On this basis, the CIA set up a cell that has hundreds of dedicated analysts - the exact figure is classified "top secret" - by reviewing more than 5 million tweets or Facebook messages exchanged in different languages each country, which has detected that the overthrow of power in Egypt was going to happen and that this communication channel would gather the people in a way that the current government could not have foreseen.
Another advantage for the U.S. military, there is no need to send individuals on hand to take the pulse of the various nations. For example, during the riots that raged through Bangkok in April 2010 that killed at least 20 dead and 825 injured, the cell of the CIA was able to follow it all remotely through the prism of the people through Twitter and Facebook. An internal source of this cell indicates that a report summary went back every day for the U.S. presidency to follow the reactions after a speech or announcement of a position in a crisis to change course as needed in a timely very short. In short, the responsiveness of social networks allows military in political life as a new opinion monitoring. A tool which French and American candidates for the presidency should not be deprived in 2012.
