This is the second of two posts written by Dr. Mark Drapeau about government 2.0. Click here to read his first post, “Government 2.0: An Insider’s Perspective.”

In June 2008, the Government Accountability Office (GAO), Congress’ investigative arm, released a report stating that, “more than 4 years after September 11, the nation still lacked the government-wide policies and processes called for in law to provide a framework for guiding and integrating a myriad of ongoing efforts to share terrorism-related information critical to protecting our homeland.”

Simply put, people in the government aren’t talking to each other enough. As one person, I cannot pretend to solve this problem, nor even understand all of the issues involved. And understandably, the details of some of the workings of government are shielded from public consumption. But for our purposes here, I ask a slightly different question: Given that governments are inherently reactive, rather than proactive (I need give no examples), how can this be compatible with the rapidly evolving world of social software?

In what I think is a good trend, people associated with the government are using Web 2.0 (whether they know it or not). Increasingly, senior officials in the national security community have LinkedIn accounts and curiously dip their toes in the Facebook and Twitter waters, if only because they hear about these sites from their daughters or research assistants. The only way to truly understand the power of Web 2.0 is to participate in it, and even the smallest foray should be applauded.

Ironically, however, many government agencies block such sites for use at work. For example, I cannot access MySpace or YouTube from the computer in my office at the Department of Defense, and the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) blocks most social networking sites besides LinkedIn. At least one part of the National Institutes of Health (NIH) blocks Google Chat. Not only do these policies make little sense (there are legitimate research uses for all of these sites, while email, iTunes, and non-blocked websites are ‘abused’ daily), the policies are inconsistent.

Despite this, there are overt sprinklings of Web 2.0 influence all over the federal government. For example, in mid-2007, the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) sponsored a public blog about pandemic influenza, which I contributed to due to my work on global health security. This was a great early example of a government agency engaging with an interested, and in many cases, expert audience.

Contemporary government blogs include very solid efforts by two agencies that people love to hate: the Transportation Security Administration (TSA), and the U.S. Postal Service – the latter of which is a very creative effort. NASA has multiple Twitter-streams in the realm of micro-blogging, and they utilize YouTube and other new media to publicize their exciting work. More budding efforts abound.

There are also promising extra-governmental efforts. Perhaps most notable among them, GovLoop was built using Ning and in only seven weeks has attracted over 500 users from federal, state, and local governments. There was also an event entitled Social Media in Government, with the goal of the conference to “capture the power of social media in your organization, along with helpful tools, tips and techniques to get started.” Activities like these are already making it easier for public servants to share ideas and knowledge.

At a recent Washington, DC-area conference entitled ”Defense 2.0,” Opening Keynote speaker Michael Nelson pointed out that the Internet has ceased to be a tool, and has evolved into a place. And Marketing 101 teaches that you want to be in the places where your target audience is. For the government, whether interested in recruiting employees, talking to subject-matter experts, or collecting counter-terrorism intelligence, using “rich media” to participate in discussions on the Internet and get people to engage with their “brand” will be increasingly important.

But Defense 2.0 is still in its infancy, with a large gap between vision and reality. Thus far, Web 2.0 efforts, while some of them are very promising (for example, Intellipedia), have mainly occurred in isolation, with lack of coordination and no overall Government 2.0 theory, strategy, or framework for using these new social tools to best serve the American people. Here, I begin to describe the beginnings of such a framework.

Mainstream media coverage of the national security community largely involves “guns and ammo,” but increasingly U.S. armed forces leverage the power of other elements of government including diplomatic, intelligence, and economic components to conduct complex, “low-intensity” operations that involve far more than combat. These efforts also regularly involve groups outside the federal government, whether they are state and local responders, military forces of other nations, or global non-governmental organizations (NGOs).

“It’s the notion of unity of effort without unity of control,” says Dr. Linton Wells II, who has a background in the Navy, previously acted as the CIO of the entire U.S. military apparatus, and is now heavily involved with efforts to provide “transportable infrastructures” including inexpensive communications technologies to disaster-relief zones (see STAR-TIDES, below).

Because modern governments now think about military missions for national security in a much broader context, opportunities to use social software can best be divided into three very broad – and diverse – arenas. They are: (1) government internal information sharing, (2) creating and nurturing relationships with non-governmental entities, and (3) empowering people, particularly those in post-disaster, post-war, or impoverished situations. Understanding the pros and cons of incorporating Web 2.0 tools into each of these circumstances is the goal of a research project I have started at the National Defense University called Social Software for Security, or S3.

Internal governmental information sharing means different things to different people. The most commonly-stated objection to the incorporation of social software into national security operations is that malware could be implanted or the social tools could otherwise provide access into government systems, thereby reducing network integrity. However, a good deal of government information, while perhaps private, is not necessarily so much so that off-the-shelf Web 2.0 sites cannot be utilized – they do typically come with some security features.

Examples of such “less secure” information exchanges include Office Directors polling staffs about coordinating schedules or planning social events, Naval Postgraduate School students using iPods with audio/video to supplement lectures, Public Affairs monitoring media feeds about topics of interest, or Human Resources bringing soldiers’ families together using social networks that provide information about local areas. Paraphrasing what Maverick might say about this information, “If I told you, I would not have to kill you.”

In the realm of developing and nurturing a social network of government employees and non-governmental entities, social software also has numerous applications. Sites like kluster can enhance communication and not only help to promote organization within an amorphous and changing coalition, but also help groups discuss problems and arrive at actionable conclusions. Some very important entities, like the Defense Science Board and the Highlands Forum, involve groups of subject matter experts from inside and outside government interacting in various ad hoc ways to solve challenging problems in national security.

A global social network along these same lines is called STAR-TIDES, or Sustainable Technologies, Accelerated Research – Transportable Infrastructures for Development and Emergency Support. STAR-TIDES is a network of governmental, non-profit, academic, and other individuals dedicated to providing low-cost, transportable infrastructure for post-disaster, impoverished, or post-war individuals; including cheap mobile communications technologies.

In the social software space, STAR-TIDES has a Twitter stream detailing conferences attended, sponsored events, daily meetings, and the like. The network may also begin using sites like kluster or DeepDebate to go through an organized, collaborative decision-making process to arrive at actionable conclusions.

Finally, STAR-TIDES is utilizing mashups in their humanitarian efforts. One, constructed by InSTEDD (Innovative Support to Emergencies, Diseases, and Disasters), is called Contacts Nearby. This program interfaces your Facebook biography with Google Maps (geographical information) and Twitter (archivable communications), allowing (say) a refugee to read about, geo-locate, and chat with a U.S. Marine unit, members of an Africa-based NGO, and other refugees with recycled, donated mobile phones. There is now similar software for the new iPhone which concentrates mainly on tagging and auto-tagging geo-located photographic information using mashups with other programs like your Google Calendar. All of these data can then be shared on blogs, wikis, and other social sites.

Related to this, online social communication – particularly scalable micro-blogs like Twitter – can also behave as an “early warning system” to rapidly detect natural disasters, and even localize their origins. As someone who researches the connection between infectious disease and international security, I have been thinking about its uses in the event of a pandemic outbreak. Could Twitter power users like Robert Scoble help to disseminate information on government posters like the one I recently created?

In the end, diverse missions will require differing social software. Many novice end users will probably know their mission requirements, but will not know which Web 2.0 tools are the best fit. As a first step towards helping such users, my Social Software for Security project has funded an effort by Desarae Veit to catalog more than 1,000 social networking sites and describe their properties that may be of use in government and humanitarian efforts – like whether they are mobile-enabled, if they are high or low bandwidth, if they are free to use, and so forth.

This information has now been incorporated into a public website that we have named Sniki, for Social Networking Wiki. To my knowledge, such a public, interactive database has not heretofore existed. I’m happy that the National Defense University could help to provide this resource to the Web 2.0 community, and in the spirit of social software I encourage you all to register on the site, edit it, and consider it yours!

Dr. Mark Drapeau is the 2006-2008 AAAS Science & Technology Policy Fellow at the Center for Technology and National Security policy of the National Defense University in Washington. These views are his own and not the official policy or position of any part of the U.S. Government. He can be reached at mark.d.drapeau@ugov.gov via email.

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This is the first of two posts written by Dr. Mark Drapeau about government 2.0.

Until a few months ago, I didn’t know what “social software” or “new media” really was. Sure, I was on Facebook and LinkedIn. I certainly used Wikipedia and Craigslist – in fact, I even wrote a newspaper opinion piece about how their business model related to terrorist networks. But, honestly, I really had no idea what was going on in the Web 2.0 space.

That all changed on March 3rd, when I attended the auspiciously named event, “Blogs Meet Booze” in Washington DC, on a lark. Interested in learning more about new media and related topics, I started attending events around the country like MashMeet DC REMIX at Ogilvy in DC, MashMeetNYC REMIX in SoHo, Community Next in Los Angeles, and Tech Cocktail Conference in Chicago. I quickly realized two things. One, social networking technologies have many military applications. Two, these geeks throw great parties.

The first sentence of Geoff Livingston’s book now is gone reads, “In life there are very few moments of clarity when you realize that things have completely changed.” And so began my adventures in Twitterland.

Some explanation of who I am is necessary here. Based inside a government think tank called the Center for Technology and National Security Policy, or CTNSP, led by Dr. Hans Binnendijk formerly of the National Security Council staff, I’m supposed to be thinking “big thoughts” all day as part of a fellowship program that recruits PhD-level scientists into public service with the federal government.

But wait a second, who am I to be analyzing social networking technology? Aren’t I a biologist who collects wild parasitic wasps from birds’ nests, videotapes tiny fruit flies copulating and was part of the international honey bee genome project? All true. But at a fundamental level, studying complex behavioral and genetic networks in animals is not so different from understanding human social networks. So to some extent, when it comes to explaining social software to military policymakers – I’m the perfect guy for the job.

And thus, recently I have been consumed with the question of: How can the government acknowledge, assess, and embrace social software? Slowly and with some collaborators including Dr. Linton Wells II who previously acted as the CIO of the Department of Defense, I have established a new research project called Social Software for Security, or S3 (everything in the military MUST have an acronym) at CTNSP. The general goals of S3 are to inventory available technologies, demonstrate effective uses of such technology throughout the government, identify impediments to use in the military, engage with experts to outline possible solutions, and ultimately make recommendations to the Department of Defense leadership on an overall military strategy for using social software for national security.

One of my overarching priorities has been to directly engage people in the community, rather than just read about them. In my travels to Web 2.0 events most people I meet are surprised that someone from the government or the Defense Department is interested in what they are doing. So while the social networking space has good ideas and technologies, and we are to some extent using the technologies, I realized that the Department of Defense is definitely underutilizing the human resources in the community. Hence, while there certainly are people thinking about Web 2.0 in the nation’s capital (and how to make a buck off it), few of them have actually met the thought leaders in the field, particularly among bloggers and new startups – despite their eminent accessibility.

My travels and conversations on Twitter and elsewhere have introduced me to many thought leaders, trends and technologies in the field of social networking. I have transformed from an outside observer to a participant and somewhat of an enthusiast. And while in each case for companies like kluster, ooVoo, Searchles, Qik, and others there are limitations for immediate use by the military or other parts of the federal government, particularly for computer systems security and classified information sharing reasons, the important point is the idea behind the company’s reason for success, not necessarily the precise technology or website.

Forrester Research recently published data showing that companies are increasingly adopting social software for various uses, and furthermore that larger companies, on average, were more likely to be adopting “enterprise 2.0” systems. This, no doubt, is because once an organization achieves a certain size, feedback loops allow the formation of complex adaptive systems that are inherently unpredictable.

Our current national security situation presents an additional reason to adopt social tools. Like the Red Queen tells Alice in the famous story, “it takes all the running you can do, to keep in the same place.” The reality of our current co-evolution with threatening terrorist networks is that they are using Internet technologies quicker and better than we are in many cases. At a recent speech in Arlington, VA, the current Navy CIO Robert Carey said, “The Internet is Al Qaeda’s command and control center.” Like Alice, we need to catch up in the race, just to stay even; and run twice as fast to pull ahead.

After learning a lot about social software in the last few months, I can safely conclude that these technologies have many potential benefits for our military forces and associated civilians. The most commonly-stated objection to the incorporation of social software into national security operations is that malware could be implanted or the social tools could otherwise provide access into government systems, thereby reducing network integrity. To be sure, cybersecurity in the “wild West” of the Web 2.0 world, particularly for the federal government, is an expensive and very serious issue, and this is one area where governments differ from corporations. When Coke’s recipe or Google’s search algorithm get out, there are certainly serious consequences, but ultimately, people don’t die. The government has a higher standard.

The defense, intelligence, and diplomatic components of the government also have missions that are unique to them, not generally seen in corporations. For example, besides overt public affairs – the person behind the podium or the press release – there are also information operations designed “to shape the emotions, motives, reasoning, and behaviors of selected foreign entities.” So, in some cases, the military will use new media overtly, in other cases messages will be attributed to other entities (e.g., a foreign government partner), and in still others the messaging will not be traced back to the U.S. at all.

With regard to Web 2.0 in a secure government environment, the country’s intelligence community is doing it right. Their INTELINK system is a walled-off group of sites that allow sophisticated online collaboration and increased communication at different levels of security. Users can obtain enterprise email, write and edit articles on Intellipedia, look up employee’s profiles and contact information, author blogs, tag news articles, and more. Yesterday, I registered for an upcoming conference within the system on a secure wiki, looked up the backgrounds of other registrants, and contacted one of the organizers.

The INTELINK system is a sophisticated, powerful product from the Office of the Director of National Intelligence (ODNI). While initially it was only for the intelligence community, more and more they are opening the system so that it can be used by people in other parts of the government – and this is being encouraged. This is excellent progress in the midst of a culture shift from “need to know” into “need to share.” As John Hale, the man at ODNI who manages Intellipedia said at a recent event at the Ritz Carlton in Arlington, VA: “It’s not about technology. It’s about people and information sharing.”

Nevertheless, I believe that Social Software for Security is a much larger issue than that. While the government certainly has unique security requirements that should and will be assuaged, I see many applications for Web 2.0 technology that go far beyond military, intelligence, diplomatic, homeland security, and law enforcement communication on private channels.

In my next Mashable post, I will develop a preliminary “theory of social government,” outline the three key missions where social software can be incorporated in different ways, and discuss two projects where my Social Software for Security project has made inroads toward incorporating off-the-shelf Web 2.0 into ongoing Defense Department-related activities.

Dr. Mark Drapeau is the 2006-2008 AAAS Science & Technology Policy Fellow at the Center for Technology and National Security policy of the National Defense University in Washington. These views are his own and not the official policy or position of any part of the U.S. Government. He can be reached at mark.d.drapeau@ugov.gov via email.

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