30-04-2004 13:20									#1
	Classified Information - What we all need to know Support Apolyton, buy Civilization III: Complete

Some things came up in chat tonight, some of them very disturbing and a few of us realized that this thread/subject hadn't even been seriously discussed. So, this needs to start now.

First off: OpSec - Operations Security

When I was in the US Air Force, I learned about a thing called OpSec (Operations Security). Basically, about the ability to figure out what the other side is doing from a lot of little bits of information. This is akin to working on a very complex Jigsaw Puzzle (if you don't know what a jigsaw puzzle is, go here: http://www.jigzone.com/), but without the completed picture to guide you. THe Information that you receive (or give) is like being handed one peice at a time and sometimes, the peice is part of an entirely different puzzle.

With communication between several people, it's hard to keep information from actually being given. This is just something that really can't be helped, but it can be reduced. The key is to remember that you are going to give out information, it's just that you want to make sure what information is given. Lying and denigning something can be just as revieling as just giving that information out straight.

The real key is to sometimes give them too much infomation. As Arnelos likes to call it, the signal to noise ratio, and the more noise that is present, the less chance of them getting any vital infoarmation from us. Roleplaying is oneway of increasing the noise and there are several others, like talking about things that don't matter in the game, etc....

But it's also important to also remember, that they are doing the same thing. Some will hide it in boasting and beligerance and some will hide it in sillyness and wittiness. But, they will hide it in some form or fashion. The thing is to be able to filter out that noise, and then being able to evaluate the information that is presented. If, lets say, a person had a private conversation with GhengisFarb for 2 hours, you might get 1 true peice of Information and maybe a couple of 1/2 truths. Then again, everything might be just BS, you can't say for sure. And until that information is verified in some manner, it can not be taken as gospel.

[EDIT] This was originally posted in RP forum, then later in the ISDG, so the GF referance was pertaining to him being on opposing teams, at that time[/edit]

So, the best thing to do, when talking to a member of a foreign team, is that they are looking to get as much information as possible. They want to be your freind. They will simpathize with your situation. They will listen and talk and maybe, even cultivate sympathy from you, the better for you to possibly open up to them. The KGB used that for years and it worked very well.

So, keep that in mind at all times when chatting with them. Do not try to turn that against them, for that is also a trap. Just be freindly and general in any chat, but becareful with that part too. If you feel that you aren't quite in control of something like that, then it's time to start. Remember, to keep saying to yourself, "what can they learn from this??" and "How can it hurt our team??" and you should be fine.

Does this need to be practiced when there are 2 games going on?
More than ever, as information that you tell someone, on another games' team, could very much, get back to someone on this game.

How can this hurt us, if someone, from some other game gets some choice Intel?
A lot. Knowing how your team deals with situations is almost 1/2 of the battle, when your trying to figure out their intentions and capabilities. Even more so, when we get to the next round, as they will have a basis in which to work off of, to make very astute assumptions as to WHAT we are doing (why and WHEN, too).

E_T

Last edited by E_T on 30-04-2004 at 22:04

	30-04-2004 13:27									#2
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Arnelos, had posted this, as a follow up, to the same, in the past. THis further expands on the OpSec Principle, especially, the Signal to noise ratio part

quote: The signal-to-noise ratio is almost certainly a very important aspect here... The thing to remember is that whether or not you tell them isn't as important as whether they pick up on it. Their liklihood of picking up on the signal is directly affected by the signal-to-noise ratio. The higher the ratio, the more likely they'll pick up the signal. So if you actually don't want them to know something, there are two ways of reducing the signal to noise ratio and thus making it less likely for them to find out. The first is to reduce the signal itself. This is what most people try to do and is the most straight-forward approach. Unfortunately, it inevitably fails. Someone always goofs eventually and something leaks that you really would rather had not been leaked. Take the Pentagon, for example.... so much stuff seems to leak out of there that it's incredible... and they certainly do whatever they can to minimize it. But that's where the other half of trying to reduce the signal-to-noise ratio comes in... The other method is to increase the amount of "noise" in order to obscure the signal. If you know it's inevitably impossible to prevent the signal from slipping out, one way of preventing its utilization by the opponent is to make sure that he's getting so much noise with the signal that he can't tell the difference. The U.S Defense Department (the Pentagon) is another great example here... the sheer number of "plans for the attack on Iraq" that have leaked over the past 2 years is staggering. It is almost certain that the VAST majority of those "plans for the attack on Iraq" were intentionally leaked in order to feed more noise into the system and confuse everyone as to which plan (if any of them...) might actually be even partially valid. The result is that you keep them guessing... because even when you DO goof and acidentally say something you'd wanted to hide, the recipient can't be sure it's not just more noise. For those working to piece information together and attempt to piece the clues together, noise is extremely frustrating. The puzzle analogy is really good one... Intelligence work is like trying to solve a gigantic jigsaw puzzle where you don't have the picture on the box, half the pieces are missing, and half the pieces you DO have belong to the wrong puzzles. The "noise" you're sending are the pieces that belong to the wrong puzzles. The more in there, the better (as long as you aren't letting the opponent then SOLVE the other puzzles, of course ). Personally, I find that using noise that is TRUE is most effective. You see, if you're throwing a non-stop stream of lies at someone, they're going to just outright doubt anything you say... which means when you have something to tell them that you really want them to take seriously, you have a problem. That's why it's better, when possible, to instead flood someone with an endless stream of information that is not entirely false and not entirely useless. Afterall, you don't want them to entirely doubt your credibility because that may be as important to you as keeping your information close to your chest. But most critically, as stated above, you'll need to use some deception to make it work. Flooding someone with a bunch of useless trivia is one way to hope that the one piece of seemingly useless triva that's actually important gets overlooked. ------------ When you want to PROVIDE information on purpose, that's a related ballgame. The trick is to somehow remain both a credible source of information and yet to provide as little information as possible except for that information you WANT them to know. Politicians attempt to do this with reporters from the media all the time... with wildly varying degrees of success Some are good at it, others obviously stink very badly at it The trick there is to both provide the signal you want them to hear (and make sure they pick up on THAT signal) while obscuring any other signals you may accidentally give off by providing them plenty of noise to think about. This is extremely tricky to do right... as many an unfortunate politician has found when he decided to act as an "anonymous source" for a reporter doing a story. The situation becomes even trickier if you want them to pick up on a certain signal, but don't want them to realize that you WANT them to know. I really can't give you an easy way of handling that... you have to play it by ear (sometimes literally) and hope you aren't being played yourself. It's a somewhat dangerous game that far too many people try to play without much inclination for it... and end up leaking all sorts of information they shouldn't have... This is why it's very important for, ideally, only the official spokesmen to be the ones talking for the group. In our case, the ambassadors or (perhaps) the higher leaders themselves. There are certain subjects that really should only be discussed by those people. But when THEY do discuss such things (or if any of us who aren't ambassadors discuss things with people from other sites other than the big ticket stuff), we should keep in mind that this is a difficult thing to do properly and CAUTION is always advisable. When you get cocky is when you'll spill something... I've done it before, I know. So be careful.... don't get too cocky and please try not to tell them ANYTHING on the aforementioned list unless expressly authorized to do so. Just to make sure that any information that get's out isn't necessarily believed immediately, it might be good to feed plenty of useless and false information from various people, however... it's worth discussing the merits of that... having plenty of noise around has its merits.

	30-04-2004 13:38									#3
	Full PM-box? Change here!

Now, some reasons for this being posted now

quote: partial log, rest will get posted tomorrow [Trip> sorry E_T, I was busy admiring our empire which has a lot more cities than Apolytonia does... :yawn: [E_T> Oh, and what year is it? [Trip> doesn't matter which year [Trip> we can go to the year you guys are in [E_T> I was just wondering if your compairing the right years [Trip> yes [Trip> we are a few turns ahead, but backtracking doesn't make much of a difference [E_T> well, your somehow mistaken [Trip> and why is that so [E_T> because, you are and you have no clue as to the things that are going on at this moment [Trip> so sayeth you [Trip> I get scores and top cities list from people in that game [Arnelos> which is pretty clear if he's comparing number of cities... [Trip> I watch what's going on [Trip> 1 city [Trip> maybe 2 soon? [WhiteBandit> hahaha

The really telling part of ths snip is this

quote: [Trip> I get scores and top cities list from people in that game

I'll see about posting the full (spam edited) Logs, from both the channel that this was recorded from and our Internal chat about the subject. I'll have to do that tomorrow, sometime.

E_T

	30-04-2004 20:15									#4
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* MrWhereItsAt feels dumb

Not knowing what Trip's status is, what exactly is this "telling"?

	30-04-2004 20:34									#5
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Ok we really have two issues here.


1. The IMPORTANCE of OPSEC and not letting any information leak.

2. The possibility that Trip maybe getting getting sensitive information about game 1 (His team CGN is in game 2.)

Lets keep this thread for general OPSEC issues.

Lets talk about a potential leak in this thread: The POSSIBLE leak thread

With that being said I will add to what E_T and Arnelos have so eloquently told us.

What we do and how we do it in this game stay in this game.

I will give an example. E_T has spent litterally HUNDREDS of hours perfecting a spreadsheet to accurately track and predict every aspect of the Interior Ministry. I believe several of us have access to that speadsheet here and are using it to help this team in this game.

If you have access to that information and you eventually go to another team in another Demo game, you are not allowed to take that information with you.

A lot of people have spent a lot of time perfecting Apoly's building, war making, intelligence gathering, etc, etc , etc efforts .

So we expect that those tools that have been developed by Apoly stay within the Apoly family.

Last edited by conmcb25 on 30-04-2004 at 20:44

	30-04-2004 21:04									#6
	Support Apolyton or Terrorists Win

Original post Moved to other thread.

quote: I will give an example. E_T has spent litterally HUNDREDS of hours perfecting a spreadsheet to accurately track and predict every aspect of the Interior Ministry. I believe several of us have access to that speadsheet here and are using it to help this team in this game.

Fairly much so, to the point that it almost becomes a copyright & Intellectual Property issue. Trip has a copy of it, because of his Consul position in that game. I have asked him not to use it for that game, but then we know how far that goes.... The thing is, part of that hundreds of hours, has been knowing what to do with it, in the fastest possible amount of time.

Another thing about it is, it's can be very time comsuming, BUT you can set things up for Months (actual play time) in advance. It's when conditions change (worker actions, unknown bonus tiles, changes in plans), that you have to go backand redo all that work.

E_T

	30-04-2004 23:55									#7
	Got spare money?

You guys aren't hitting on my concern.... my concern is that Trip is talking to members of OTHER teams in OUR game. If our team tells pertinent things to Trip, he's liable to mention it to those members of other teams.

In fact, Trip may be working (de facto) as an advisor to at least one team in Game 1. Such action would be clearly unsavory from my opinion, but it wouldn't surprise me. Afteral, Trip tried to join our forum here while being on the CGN team, so he obviously doesn't consider it to be a problem.

Frankly, I think we might raise the issue at the U.N. about members of a team in Game 1 advising teams in Game 2 or the other way around. We could always bring it up that we've heard that some of this may be going on and some of our team members have close ties to members of teams in the other game, we could engage in this if permitted.

If approached from that angle, I suspect that the U.N. would vote to ban the practice, which is what we want. Sure, it means we can't actively work to help CFC or others, but then Trip and company can't actively work to help CDG and GWT can't work actively to help GCA and the other way around.

	01-05-2004 00:21									#8
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Sorry Arny, I have been trying to make sure the pertinent threads were updated this morning to make sure we stressing the need to stop any leaks here.

I agree this maybe one way of handling it.

The concern I hve though with going public would be that it will only make Trip be more carefull (I would assume but you never know about that ego of his )

and ultimately if he is doing something wrong he won't get caught.

Although stopping the flow of information would be a very good thing.

	01-05-2004 00:41									#9
	Support Apolyton or Terrorists Win

I'm already curious about those spread sheets. May I have a copy of them at nebucadnez2at (at) yahoo com?

The only forum I'm visiting is this one and even here I don't spend enough time to read all the forums about civ3. What I mean is you can be sure I'll not use that information against you.

Last edited by ormuzd on 01-05-2004 at 01:10

	01-05-2004 00:44									#10
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quote: Originally posted by ormuzd I'm already curious about those spread sheets. Can I have a copy of them at nebucadnez2at (at) yahoo com? The only forum I'm visiting is this one and even here I don't spend enough time to read all the forums about civ3. What I mean is you can be sure I'll not use that information against you.

[EDIT by E_T] see below[/edit]

	01-05-2004 00:51									#11
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I beleave that GodKing is either making new ones, with using my sheets as a basis OR just redoing info from mine to fit this game. The problem I have right now, we giving out some of this, is it's chock full of PTW ISDG info and I can't release them to just anyone.....

I think I might have a "standard"/generic set floating around on my hard drive, so I'll see about sending those. I might even post them here, too. I just have to make certain that they are "sanitized" first, before I do.....

E_T