TheOpen Source Enterprise (OSE) is aUnited States Government organization dedicated toopen-source intelligence. Initially part of the Office of theDirector of National Intelligence, it is now part of the Directorate of Digital Innovation at theCentral Intelligence Agency (CIA). Former iterations of the organization were theOpen Source Center (OSC) and theForeign Broadcast Information Service (FBIS).
In the fall of November 1992,SenatorDavid Boren, then Chairman of theSenate Select Committee on Intelligence, sponsored the National Security Act of 1992, attempting to achieve modest reform in theU.S. Intelligence Community. His counterpart on the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence wasCongressman Dave McCurdy. The House version of the legislation included a separate Open Source Office, at the suggestion of Larry Prior, a Marine Reservist withMarine Corps Intelligence Command experience then serving on theHouse Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence staff.
TheAspin-Brown Commission stated in 1996 that US access to open sources was "severely deficient" and that this should be a "top priority" for both funding andDCI attention.
In issuing its July 2004 report, the9/11 Commission recommended the creation of an open source intelligence agency, but without further detail or comment.[1] Subsequently, theWMD Commission (also known as the Robb-Silberman Commission) report in March 2005 recommended the creation of an Open Source Directorate at theCIA.
Following these recommendations, in November 2005 theDirector of National Intelligence announced the creation of the DNI Open Source Center. The Center was established to collect information available from "the Internet, databases, press, radio, television, video, geospatial data, photos and commercial imagery."[2] In addition to collecting openly available information, it would train analysts to make better use of this information. Central to the establishment of the new organization was Assistant Deputy Director of National Intelligence for Open Source (ADDNI/OS),Eliot A. Jardines. The OSC absorbed the CIA's previously existingForeign Broadcast Information Service (FBIS), originally established in 1941, with FBIS headDouglas Naquin named as director of the Center.[3]
In response to theCuban Missile Crisis and START Treaty, FBIS was tasked with monitoring for clandestine and encoded messages from all nations and coordinating broadcast media contact points who could instantly broadcast urgent messages on "All Channels" and "All Calls" and mutually receive messages in all languages and codings from any foreign broadcast station. This task continues despite the Open Source Center'sDNI reorganization.[citation needed]
On October 1, 2015, the OSC changed its name to Open Source Enterprise and was absorbed into the CIA's Directorate of Digital Innovation.[4] On December 21, 2022, Randy Nixon was appointed as director of OSE, having previously served as the CIA's Director of Digital Futures.[5] Nixon served as director until September 2025.[6]
OSE provides material to theNational Technical Information Service (NTIS) and other government officials through the online news serviceWorld News Connection.
The headquarters of OSE is located in theReston Town Center development in Reston, Virginia, in the former headquarters of the FBIS.[7][8] The construction of the facility sparked some controversy in Reston, aplanned community, due to the presence of a chained linked and barbed wire fence surrounding the buildings. In the late 1980s, the CIA agreed to install a more aesthetically pleasing fence around the buildings.[9]
From 1943 until 2017, OSE operated a facility atCaversham Park alongside the UK's equivalent open-source intelligence service,BBC Monitoring. In an information-sharing collaboration at Caversham, BBC Monitoring handled media from 25% of the world while Open Source handled the remaining 75%.[10] The division was closed in October 2017.[11]
38°57′19″N77°21′37″W / 38.9552°N 77.3602°W /38.9552; -77.3602