We believe an employee communicated with
his/her handler(s) (a contact from the criminal
network) through Flitter, however we do not know
the Flitter name of the handler nor of the
espionage organization. We believe that the
associated network may take one of two forms of
social structures:
A. The employee has about 40 Flitter
contacts. Three of these contacts are his
handlers, people in the criminal organization
assigned to obtain his cooperation. Each of the
handlers probably has between 30 to 40 Flitter
contacts and share a common middle man in the
organization, who we have code-named Boris. Boris
maintains contact with the handlers, but does not
allow them to communicate among themselves using
Flitter. Boris communicates with one or two others
in the organization and no one else. One of these
contacts is his likely boss, who we've codenamed
Fearless Leader. Fearless Leader probably has a
broad Flitter network (well over 100 links),
including international contacts.
B. The employee has about 40 Flitter
contacts. Three of these contacts are his
handlers, people in the organization assigned to
obtain his cooperation. Each of the handlers
likely has between 30 to 40 Flitter contacts, and
each probably has his or her own middle man in the
organization, who we've code-named Boris, Morris
and Horace. It is probable the middle men will not
allow the handlers to communicate among themselves
using Flitter. Each of the middle men probably
communicate with one or two others in the
organization, and no one else. One of the contacts
for all of the middle men is the head of the
organization, Fearless Leader. Fearless Leader has
a broad Flitter network (well over 100 links)
including international contacts.
In addition to the above, the two social
structures have geospatial implications. While a
target and handler may be in a large city, a
middleman might be in nearby smaller locations. A
leadership role, such as the one of Fearless
Leader, would likely require a presence in a
larger city.
Download dataset.
Reference: IEEE VAST mini challenge 2009
