OSINT and open source intelligence in Africa
OSINT (open source intelligence) means collecting, verifying and analysing information that anyone can legally access: online press, social media, public registers, archives, published images and videos.
Cabinet 86 puts OSINT at the service of its clients’ decisions in Africa: reputational due diligence on partners and executives, mapping of players and networks, detection of influence and disinformation operations, monitoring of the political and economic context, digital investigation before or during a crisis. We work from our offices in Paris and Abidjan, and operate in Dakar, Conakry, Casablanca and Rabat.
What is OSINT?
The term comes from the intelligence world, where it refers to one collection discipline, alongside human and technical intelligence. In French it is called renseignement en sources ouvertes (ROSO). A source is open when anyone can access it legally, free or for a fee, without deception or intrusion.
OSINT is a method: start from a precise question, collect widely, verify every item, cross-check sources, then deliver an analysis that separates what is established from what remains a hypothesis. Investigative journalists, fact-checking teams, researchers and business intelligence teams form a very active OSINT community. We apply its methods to reputation, influence and decision-making.
Legally accessible to all, free or for a fee.
- Online press
- Social media
- Public registers
- Archives
- Published images and videos
- Private groups
- Fake profiles
- Intrusion into a system
- Hacked data or illicit leaks
- 1A precise question
- 2Collect widely
- 3Verify every item
- 4Cross-check sources
- 5Established or hypothesis
What we do with OSINT
Reputational due diligence
Before signing with a partner, appointing an executive or joining a project, our clients want to know what can be found about them: allegations in the press, public litigation, business links, public positions, online controversies. We build this reputational profile from open sources, with a confidence level for each piece of information. This check complements, but does not replace, legal and compliance checks. See also our executive reputation services.
Mapping players and networks
Who is talking about a subject, who amplifies whom, who runs which media and which pages? We identify the players who shape a conversation, their links and their audiences, and we present them as graphs and profiles an executive committee can read.
Detecting influence and disinformation operations
Accounts created in batches, synchronised posts, fake media outlets, content recycled from one country to another: OSINT makes it possible to spot a coordinated campaign, reconstruct its timeline and measure its real reach. Attribution hypotheses are stated with their confidence level and never presented as certainties. This is the foundation of our work countering information manipulation.
Monitoring the political and economic context
Elections, government reshuffles, sector reforms, social tensions, donor positions: we follow over time what could affect a project or an organisation, and we deliver situation notes that link weak signals to the decisions to be made. See our strategic monitoring and online reputation services.
Digital investigation before and during a crisis
Before a crisis, OSINT reveals vulnerabilities: sensitive information that is already public, old content that could resurface, accounts impersonating you. During a crisis, it establishes the origin of a document, an image or a rumour, and documents how it spread to inform decisions. Our crisis communication team for Africa relies on this work.
What is different in Africa
OSINT methods were mostly formalised in environments rich in X content, open databases and digitised registers. On the continent the ground is different, and an investigation has to take that into account.
- Facebook and TikTok. News pages, community pages, influential accounts and short videos carry a large share of public debate, far more than X.
- WhatsApp. Private groups are not open sources and we do not enter them. We follow what surfaces publicly: statuses, screenshots reposted on Facebook, media quoting “messages going around”.
- Online press. Plentiful and fast-moving, it picks up and rewrites quickly. Finding the first publication of a story is often the key to an investigation.
- Radio. It remains a leading medium, and its programmes, increasingly rebroadcast online, are sources in their own right.
- Multilingualism. Part of the conversation takes place in Wolof, Pular, Susu, Malinke, Dioula, Arabic or Darija. We include it with native-speaker reviewers and transcription and translation tools whose every output is checked.
- Public registers. Trade registers, official gazettes, public procurement notices, published court decisions: online access varies from country to country, and reading them requires knowledge of local institutions.
Our Abidjan office gives us this reading of the ground every day.
Our method: the intelligence cycle
Every assignment follows the five steps of the intelligence cycle. These are also the OSINT good practices we recommend to any team getting started:
- 1. The requirement. A precise question, framed with you: which decision should the investigation inform, within what scope, by when?
- 2. Collection. Broad, traceable collection: every item is captured, timestamped and archived with its source, so it can be found and checked again.
- 3. Verification. Cross-checking sources, checking dates, places and authors, tracing the origin of images and documents. Unverified information is flagged as such.
- 4. Analysis. Connecting the facts, explicit hypotheses and confidence levels, distinguishing between what is established, probable or merely possible.
- 5. Reporting. A deliverable suited to the decision: summary note, map, timeline or evidence file, presented by the consultants who carried out the investigation.
Our practices draw on the OSINT community’s public standards, in particular the Berkeley Protocol on Digital Open Source Investigations, published with the United Nations Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights.
OSINT tools: what we use
OSINT tools change quickly, and none of them replaces the analyst. We combine several families of tools, public or commercial, chosen according to the assignment:
- Advanced search. Search engines, Boolean operators and queries built to cross-reference names, places, organisations and languages.
- Images and videos. Reverse search, metadata reading, geolocation and chronolocation to date and place content.
- Web archives. Deleted pages and accounts, successive versions of a website, posting history.
- Domains and websites. Domain name registration and hosting history, to link websites that appear independent.
- Media and social media monitoring. Press and social media monitoring platforms, with alerts set up on your topics.
- Mapping. Network analysis tools to show the links between accounts, pages, media and organisations.
- Artificial intelligence. Transcription, translation, sorting large volumes of content and spotting patterns. AI speeds up reading, but every conclusion is checked by an analyst.
A strict ethical and legal framework
Our work rests on simple rules that protect our clients as much as the people studied:
- publicly accessible sources only;
- no intrusion into any system, no bypassing of passwords or access restrictions;
- no infiltration of private groups, no fake profiles, no impersonation;
- no use of hacked data or data from illicit leaks;
- personal data collected only where the assignment requires it, kept for as long as needed, then deleted.
We apply the GDPR in France and Europe, the personal data protection laws of the African countries where we work, and the principles of the African Union Convention on Cyber Security and Personal Data Protection, known as the Malabo Convention. We are not lawyers: whenever an assignment raises a legal question, we work with our partner lawyers or with yours.
Assignments on the ground in Africa
Our assignments are confidential. Without naming clients, here are three examples of assignments based on open source monitoring:
- Senegal. Political digital communication support and strategic monitoring.
- Guinea, in Conakry. Digital communication for a leading mining company and monitoring of the country’s political and economic situation.
- Morocco, in Rabat and Casablanca. Support for a ministry with political digital communication and strategic monitoring.
We also work in Côte d’Ivoire from our Abidjan office and have already carried out assignments in Madagascar. Our area of work also covers Cameroon, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Gabon, Benin, Togo, Congo-Brazzaville and Tunisia.
OSINT, strategic monitoring and business intelligence
OSINT is one of the pillars of business intelligence and strategic monitoring. Monitoring follows a subject over time; OSINT answers a precise question, often in depth and under time pressure. At Cabinet 86, the two work together: monitoring detects the signal, open source investigation explains it, and our advice turns it into a communication decision.
Do you have a question to investigate, a partner to check or a campaign to understand?
Let’s talk in a first confidential 45-minute conversation, in Paris, in Abidjan or remotely.
Frequently asked questions
What is OSINT?
OSINT (open source intelligence) is the collection, verification and analysis of information that anyone can legally access: press, social media, public registers, archives, published images and videos. Cabinet 86 uses it for reputational due diligence, mapping of players, detection of disinformation campaigns and strategic monitoring.
Is OSINT legal?
Yes, when it is limited to publicly accessible sources and respects personal data law. We do not enter any system, infiltrate any private group or create any fake profile, and we apply the GDPR as well as African data protection laws, with our partner lawyers.
What is the difference between OSINT and strategic monitoring?
Strategic monitoring follows a subject over time and flags what changes. OSINT is an investigative method that answers a precise question: who is behind a website, where an image comes from, what links two players. Monitoring detects the signal; OSINT explains it.
Do you carry out OSINT in Africa?
Yes. From our offices in Paris and Abidjan, we carry out assignments in Côte d’Ivoire, Senegal, Guinea and Morocco, in Dakar, Conakry, Rabat and Casablanca, taking local habits into account: Facebook, TikTok, the public traces of WhatsApp, online press, radio and sources in national languages.
Which OSINT tools do you use?
Several families of tools, public or commercial: advanced search, reverse image search, web archives, domain name history, media and social media monitoring, network mapping and artificial intelligence for transcription and translation. No tool replaces human verification.
Can OSINT detect an influence operation?
Yes. Accounts created in batches, synchronised posts, fake media outlets and recycled content leave public traces. We document them, measure the campaign’s real reach and state attribution hypotheses with their confidence level, before recommending a proportionate response.