#SenecaProud

Pat Perdue  00:00

Hey, I'm Pat Perdue and I want to introduce you to my latest podcast. This is a co-production between my company YCastr and Seneca College in Toronto. Seneca College is a really great school. I know because over the past couple of years, I've been teaching some marketing and business and customer experience courses there. People come to study at Seneca from all over the world, which makes it a hotbed of innovative thinking. And a big part of that thinking is driven by our amazing faculty, many of whom are well like me, professionals, who are thriving in their own businesses, and teach at Seneca as a way to share their passion for what they do. But needless to say, I've been hugely inspired by the people I've met. And what happens when I get inspired? Well, apparently, I launch a podcast. So here we are. Welcome to the Seneca Proud podcast, where I get to introduce you to some of Seneca College's amazing faculty. So subscribe, download and join me as we meet some of the super inspiring folks who teach here at Seneca College in Toronto. I'm Pat Perdue, and I'm glad you're here today.

All right, welcome to another episode of the Seneca proud Podcast. I'm Pat Perdue. I'm so glad you're joining us today. This episode is so cool. Our guest today is Dr. Cami Condon. Let me tell you about Dr. Condon. She is the Academic Co-ordinator, as well as the professor for the newly launched Crime and Intelligence Analysis degree program taught out of Seneca College's King campus. A former crime analyst with the Halton Regional Police Service, Professor Condon received her BA in Criminal Justice from Michigan State University and her Master of Science and PhD from the University of Liverpool. Cami is a longtime member researcher of iBrabo, a Canadian based Open Source Intelligence Research Group. Cami’s role with iBrabo includes assisting in collaborative research in the areas of conflict monitoring, extreme misuse of social media intelligence, and identifying persons at risk for recruitment to violent extremism. So, in other words, when Dr. Condon isn't in the classroom teaching about intelligence analysis, she's out there catching real life bad guys. Like she's the real deal. And the kind of skills she applies to catch those bad guys, that's the kind of stuff they cover in this course. Do you already want to take it? I kind of do. So Cami joined us in the sandbox studio, where we started our conversation, talking a little bit about her background. And then we get right into the genesis of the Crime Intelligence and Analysis degree program, which as I mentioned, I kinda already want to take. Okay, here's my conversation with Dr. Cami Condon. 

In other words, you’re way cooler than I am. So, anyways, Cami has joined us here in the sandbox studio at Newnham. Thank you so much for joining us and taking your time out to speak with us today.

 

Camie Condon  03:00

Thank you very much for having me. I'm very excited to be here.

 

Pat Perdue  03:03

So, when you're not teaching at Seneca, you're catching some seriously bad, dangerous dudes.

 

Camie Condon  03:07

We have been known to catch a few, yes. One or two. Yeah.

 

Pat Perdue  03:11

Okay. So we'll get to that. 

 

Camie Condon  03:13

Sure. 

 

Pat Perdue  03:14

Tell us a little bit about the program, it is brand new, let's start with how did it begin?

 

Camie Condon  03:18

It was about six years ago, it was, I would say a brainchild of the former chair, Larry White. And the idea was that the industry and not just policing or the military, but several different industry leaders were looking for analysts and some form of standardization. Some people that would be able to walk into the job and have a background in what it means to be an analyst. And it doesn't exist. The only other program that does any sort of formal training in intelligence and analytical work would be BCIT, which is out West. And it was just noted at the time that there's a gap in the educational market here for that type of work. And so they put together a research panel and members of the public, they brought them together. They did a lot of consultation. They asked what types of skills they were looking for, what different types of industries could use analysts and what kind of analytical work they would be looking for. And slowly the program began to take shape. And it has been a long birthing process over the last six years, and it has all culminated this January.

 

Pat Perdue  04:26

Wow. Well, congratulations for launching it. 

 

Camie Condon  04:29

Thank you 

 

Pat Perdue  04:30

Any surprises? Like they probably had one vision and now that it's more or less cooked, it might be different from what they set out to do. Or any sort of changes since you've been onboard? Anything that you've noticed or shifts that you've made?

 

Camie Condon  04:41

There haven't been any shifts so far. I think that the biggest surprise, if you will, is the fact that analytical work has a very policing cachet to it. The reality is, in consultation with the public, is that it's not just policing. So biggest change is the wide avenue of jobs that are open for students who have this as their background. So it's not just policing, it could be in the military, it could be in public safety, it could be in banking.

 

Pat Perdue  05:11

So it could be in the private sector, for sure. 

 

Camie Condon  05:13

It could absolutely be in the private sector. And what I have been telling the students who have been asking me already, what type of jobs can we look for? I'm repeatedly saying your limit is your imagination, there is no bounds to what can be done with an analytical degree.

 

Pat Perdue  05:27

And it's so top of mind, we always hear about data breaches. I think, even just today or yesterday, I was reading about some sort of massive data breach somewhere, I don't know where it was. So these are the kinds of roles that graduates of the program would be entering into?

 

Camie Condon  05:43

Yes, absolutely. And there are, it's not always, you know, it's not as malevolent as somebody stealing your data always. It's also learning how to use the data that is available out there to your benefit. So there's a place in marketing and business for analysts who are good with sentiment analysis. So how did our product launch? Did it target the market we were looking for? How did they respond? Was it positive and negative? What words should we use or not use? How does that trigger a certain group of people in a positive or negative fashion? So there are multiple uses just beyond somebody breached into the Macy's and stole all of their marketing information and their clients that purchase.

 

Pat Perdue  06:28

This is all under the banner of crime prevention.

 

Camie Condon  06:31

Crime and intelligence, crime and intelligence analysis. 

 

Pat Perdue  06:34

So rather than say, a marketing approach to look for keywords that would make a marketing campaign effective, it might be an approach to see what organizations have used keywords to target specific groups to behave in a particular way.

 

Camie Condon  06:45

Absolutely. So there s a behavioral component to it as well. So how do we shape thought? How do we shape behavioral practices in people just by the way that we push information out to them? So in the US with the scandal around the use of Facebook, and false marketing, or generating false narratives, that's all a part of gathering intelligence, analyzing what works. What triggers people? What's interesting? And shaping a narrative and pushing it out as though it was fact. That is a part of the intelligence gathering and analytical work as well.

 

Pat Perdue  07:21

So timely for the program. 

 

Camie Condon  07:25

Yes, very.

 

Pat Perdue  07:26

Congratulations.

 

Camie Condon  07:29

That the world is having so many issues at the moment?

 

Pat Perdue  07:32

There's a statistic that I read about eight years ago that one in four jobs that will be occurring in 10 years, we hadn't even thought of yet. And I think this might be one

 

Camie Condon  07:46

This might be one of them. All of the different ways that we can use intelligence and analytical work. Absolutely.

 

Pat Perdue  07:52

So if I'm a young person thinking of this program, or thinking of my potential future, what's a good question I can ask myself to understand if it's a good program for me?

 

Camie Condon  08:02

Do you like be nosy?

 

Pat Perdue  08:04

Super nosy!

 

Camie Condon  08:05

If you like to be nosy. And you do have some patience for you know, the time periods where it's going to be a little bit slow. And you're, you're constructing your data, this is for you. So if you are into the inner workings of how social media affects our understanding of our neighbors, or of different cultures, or different cultural practices, if you'd like that sort of thing, this is for you. If you kind of have a programming background, and you like coding and that sort of thing, there's a role with that skill set in this type of work as well. It's very beneficial to be able to have that. If you are into spy and espionage stuff. Sure. I mean, there's an element of that because as I said, the be nosy piece is that you're really, you're picking a particular target or a particular group of people and you're monitoring their activity, their open source, open source activity, so it's publicly available. We do not engage in any behind the scenes hacking. Some trainers like to use the word ethical hacking, I think that that might be a little bit, a bit of a misnomer. And we just don't want to get into that gray, that gray area of everything that we do. All of the skill sets that we will be training people with is openly available free information, all you need to have is a computer and you got to figure out how to get to it.

 

Pat Perdue  09:20

Computer. Internet. 

 

Camie Condon  09:22

Computer. Internet. And then we will provide this the analytical skills to be able to make that information meaningful.

 

Pat Perdue  09:27

These days, people are so technologically savvy, and very savvy with Facebook and you're saying not as savvy as they think they are. Is that where this is going?

 

Camie Condon  09:36

I believe that what people think is technologically savvy is really technologically proficient but not technologically literate. So they know how to do the one click, they can kind of get where it is that they need to go. I need to go to Facebook. But then to critically analyze the information that they're receiving, most of us do not know how to click beyond that. So we don't know the difference between the validity and reliability of Wikipedia versus Google Scholar. We don't know how to take information that we've read off of Twitter or Facebook and determine whether there is reliability around that information. So our news sources that we're reading, are they legitimate news sources? Are they source done? Are other sources reliable? We don't have the skill set to get past that. It’s that surface level? Right.

 

Pat Perdue  10:29

Right. Is this something that you cover in your program? 

 

Camie Condon  10:31

Yes. 

 

Pat Perdue  10:32

So almost like a media literacy component? 

 

Camie Condon  10:34

Absolutely. There is a media literacy, I believe that the way that we approach it is more from a critical thinking aspect. So it is critical thinking around, okay, so I've gathered a whole bunch of data. And I think the numbers are telling me this, but it's more than just what the numbers are on the page. It's things like, well, who supplied me with these numbers? What is their agenda?

 

Pat Perdue  10:53

What do they stand to gain by my having a certain opinion?

 

Camie Condon  10:56

Absolutely. And why did they why did they format the numbers in this fashion? And what other follow up questions should we be asking around these numbers? You know, why was this collected and measured? And this wasn't?

 

Pat Perdue  11:06

Fascinating. So it's a program. So there's a variety of courses in the program, and so what do you teach?

 

Camie Condon  11:13

This semester, because as I said, we just started, I am teaching the Criminology course. So it's an introduction into criminology. Because as any degree program, in order to understand the applied portion of your work, you need to have a good theoretical grounding. Our first year is a lot of theoretical work. And so the criminology course, it will introduce students to all of that theory, with the you know, people kind of roll their eyes and they think, “Oh, I don't want to know this”. But if we understand where we came from, then we understand what our building blocks are, and then we can make some application from there. That's very practical.

 

Pat Perdue  11:47

Do most of your students intend to get into policing of some kind? 

 

Camie Condon  11:52

No. I think there are many. There's a good split that many that do want to go into some sort of policing. But again, from the top of our interview together, it is that understanding that this type of work is not just geared towards policing, that there are a lot of other applications. So I'm even expecting the ones that think they want to go into policing may potentially change their mind as they gain some confidence in their skill sets and see the other types of work that are available out there.

 

Pat Perdue  12:20

What's a course that has people most jazzed up?

 

Camie Condon  12:23

I would think the exciting ones would be in the fifth and sixth semester, where we're getting into social media analysis. We also have courses in strategic and tactical crime analysis, which would be very geared to those who want to go into policing. But those are quite interesting as well,

 

Pat Perdue  12:40

I could see that. Can you walk me through one or two aspects of those courses?

 

Camie Condon  12:44

So in the social media analysis course, because our program is very applied, by the time we're into the sixth and seventh semester, we have, we have laid the foundation with our theory, and we've moved on to very practical application work. So, in that course, there would be a lot of work around identifying the different forms of social media, the different ways to collect information off of social media, such as Facebook, or Instagram. So, things like using tracker information. So, if you leave your cell phone on, and you're on Instagram, or Facebook, on your cell phone, and you're moving around, and you're locator devices are open, then once I have access or found your account, I can literally map where you go day to day. It's open to the world. And if you leave it on consistently, I can start to develop a pattern of your behaviors over time, what you do on the weekend, where you go, what things trigger you to sign in, or to hit a ‘Like’ button, or I can collect all of that.

 

Pat Perdue  13:44

Now, this is something that you're proficient in anyway right? This is what you do when you're not at Seneca teaching. 

 

Camie Condon  13:51

Yes, this is what this is what I do.

 

Pat Perdue  13:53

Can you walk me through a little bit of that, and maybe a little bit of your journey, working for the police services and getting into this part of the business?

 

Camie Condon  14:01 

Well, I think I was dragged into the Ocen portion. Not only because I worked for the police service, and it was it was necessary as more people were using their social media platforms and leaving their locators on. And the information that we can gather from that. I was kind of dragged in by my partner, Jeff Weyer and iBrabo, because he also happens to be my husband. He was doing a PhD in violent extremism and radicalization. And from there we discovered that we had a valuable skill set that other people were looking for,

 

Pat Perdue  14:32

You know, I'm hearing Liam Neeson talk right now. “I have a unique set of skills.”

 

Camie Condon  14:38

I have a unique set of skills. And because of that, recognizing that we had that set of skills that other people were looking for, like the ability to do social media scrubbing, if you will, which is just that idea of tracking and trend, seeing and looking for sources. And being able to identify people who are led towards radicalization or who may appear to be but are actually aren't radicalized. So that was a skill set that we delivered, there was a market for it. And it kind of blossomed into something much bigger. We started doing a little bit of risk monitoring and some threat assessment work for some countries around the world. We've done a little bit of training with the counterterrorism officers in New Zealand, around using social media platforms and gathering information. And so we decided that in 2016, we might as well make it formal. We incorporated under the name of iBrabo in Canada,

 

Pat Perdue  15:30

You're able to, based on publicly accessible information, identify people who are currently at risk that are worth sort of, you might want to keep an eye on them based on their behavior. And if something changes and their interactions,

 

Camie Condon  15:44

We had created a data set of people that we believed were kind of worthwhile watching largely because of their Twitter feeds, and the type of information that they were putting out on Twitter. And so, through that collection of that database information and the people that we were watching - two of the characters that we came across, the first one was Toronto, Jane. Toronto, Jane was the first female that we can tell from our dataset, which is that we have over 300 individuals in the dataset. She was the first female that appeared to have a reconnaissance position in ISIS. And she left her location device on her phone, and she was tweeting from Pearson airport, all the way to Raqqa, in Syria. And she was tweeting out information about her role within ISIS in what she was doing. And so that generated a little bit of attention. And we had some visitors think, yeah, we had some visits from the CBC and I think the RCMP might have dropped by one day I'm not quite sure. And then the other one, there were a couple of others, there was the Kiwi jihadi who had done the same thing. He was a New Zealander who had traveled from New Zealand, under the guise of being an educator. He was teaching English in the Islamic State. And I guess the other one would be Sami Alabi. Sami Alabi was a Canadian that left here and went to the Islamic State several years ago. He had a YouTube video that became very popular where he was shooting, while viewed, he was shooting his Canadian passport and setting it on fire. And he only came to attention because he was in our dataset, and we brought his information forward.

 

Pat Perdue  17:22

So are these the skills and specific techniques and tactics that you're bringing to the program?

 

Camie Condon  17:27

Yes, in fact, that course that is the social media course is predicated on everything that our team has done at iBrabo, and the skill sets that we've developed. I have to credit Michael Buzzell. A shout out to Mr. Buzzell and his all of his textbooks and writings on intelligence; open source intelligence techniques. Michael Buzzell was a FBI agent. He has been to Canada several times to train crime analysts, police, crime analysts and police officers in the techniques of open source data collection. He's very generous in the fact that his website and the skills that he teaches are all open, they're free, you can go onto his website and start using .his tools today and checking them out. And he has written some really good instructional textbooks on his skills and how he does what he does. And we will be using one of his textbooks in our courses. He's an incredible presenter, and he has mad open-source skills, like the things that are way beyond my comprehension.

 

Pat Perdue  18:28

Is this the only program of its kind?

 

Camie Condon  18:32

We're the only one in Ontario. We are the only one that does specifically what we do on the east side of Canada. Though, like I said, the west side would probably be our only competition at the moment, which would be BCIT, who has a similar formatted program. In looking at their program, theirs does seem to be geared a little bit more towards the policing world. They have been around and for a while now and are fairly well established. I happen to know the co-ordinator out there, his name is Ryan Procs. And he has intense skills as well. He has very good skills. In fact, I had gone out there as a researcher at one point with a colleague of mine, Dr. Kerry Sanders, to do research on the work that analysts do. And we spent quite a bit of time with Ryan Procs. And when I was coming back, I would talk to my boss at Halton Regional Police. And I'm like, I want to stay in Vancouver. And I want to work for the Vancouver Police Department because they really know what to do with their analysts. Yeah, so they have an amazing analysts program with Vancouver Police Department. And he takes that skill set and he teaches it in the BCIT. So we are unique on this side. And I would say the difference would be that we just have perhaps a broader scope that it's more than just policing, its public safety, emergency service management, as well as the business and financial world.

 

Pat Perdue  19:48

Is there any cross pollination or collaboration between the two programs at all?

 

Camie Condon  19:52

Not at my level. There hasn't been. We'll see what the future holds. 

 

Pat Perdue  19:57

Sure. Speaking of the future, you know, you're starting the program now. As you're looking at the curriculum, as you're going through it, where do you see it headed? Given that the terrain is shifting almost, you know, every few months, there might be a little different data set that's available, another data set that's no longer available to you like the terrain shifts so quickly in social media?

 

Camie Condon  20:19

Well, there's a couple of things. And you're absolutely right. I think just to back up for a second, I think one of the most important things is that a lot of my work in the past, I have depended heavily on people leaving Location Services open. And I have depended heavily on the fact that people don't know what VPNs are, so they don't know how to cloak their IP address. People, including criminals, or, you know, evil masterminds, they learn and change over time. It was one of the foundational pieces that I was taught in my master's program, learn and change. So as they learn, now you have your smartphones usually have a VPN built right in or you can purchase one, or you can use an IP cloaker for free. So those things change, and we have to this industry is going to have to learn how to work around them. So that being said, we will have to change over time. But the instructors that we have in this program all come from some form of the industry. They all have really good skill sets when it comes to using social media, or at least learning how to get beyond that one click syndrome. We talked about. Knowing how to go beyond just that interesting, critical thinking around this problem that will arise over time. 

 

Pat Perdue  21:31

Hey, you know if you're not going to take the course, but you still want to geek out a little bit on the topic and find out what professionals are reading. Dr. Condon came prepared with some books that she thought would interest us. 

Here's Dr. Condon. 

Are there books? Tell me if there's a book that you're reading right now and you'd like to share with us?   

 

Camie Condon  21:53

I think that people who want like perhaps the exciting piece of it would really like The Looming Tower by Lawrence Wright. And Black Flags by Joby Warrick. They're nonfiction. So Looming Tower that was written by Lawrence Wright is the relationship between John O'Neill who was the head of Alec station as ISIS was kind of up and coming. And John O'Neill had a young analyst recruit, who was who became his best friend over time. His name was Ali Soufan, phenomenal story that gives insight into the contentious relationship between the FBI and the CIA, and how they were trying to battle the rise of Bin Laden, but not communicating with each other. And the Black Flags one by Joby Warrick, which is a Pulitzer Prize, so is The Looming Tower. If you were going to read them, I would read that one first and then do The Looming Tower because they kind of build on each other.  Same idea. That one introduces you to Nada Bakos, who was the CIA agent who brought down or who targeted Osama bin Laden, phenomenal female. I see her as an inspiration for any woman over 30. She had gotten into analyst work after a 10 year marriage had failed. 

 

Pat Perdue  23:11

Sounds like a movie. 

 

Camie Condon  24:00

It really should have been. She now has her own book called Targeter which introduces to that kind of snazzy world. I think if you wanted something that was really about how you apply it, Gray Work would be good, but it's kind of dry. Okay, and if you were looking for some good stuff, I think that the Triple Agent would be good, which is also by Joby Warrick. Those are just some of the books. Like I said, Nada Bakos book is called The Targeter. And that's kind of her life story. There’s journal articles for the scholarly.

 

Pat Perdue  23:41

And you sort of, you know, you’re scholarly, PhD. And also you’re very applied. 

The program is very, very applied. So and you personally. So what draws you? Is it the glamorized fiction stories? Or is it the pretty intense, from my layman's perspective, academic side?

 

Camie Condon  24:01

It really just boils down to the nosy.

I've always been fascinated by human behavior since I took my very first psychology class in high school. And I carry that all the way through. And it is that aspect of human behavior kind of mixed with the legal aspects. So how does this act fit a, a criminal code offense sort of thing? Sure. So how does the law work around that I love those two things mesh together, the fact that I can then look at somebody's behavior on the internet, and you know, ask myself ethical questions around well, is that illegal behavior? Is that an unethical behavior? Or is it something that we shouldn't, that is none of our business and yet it's still out there? Like how all of these things translate into is this somebody that I want to talk for a little while? So it's all very interesting and for the students who think that they want to become crime analysts, there's a series of articles that have been done by Dr. Sanders at the at Wilfrid Laurier University who was actually one of our contributing supporters to our program, the WLU one. She's done probably 10 to 12 years of research in crime analysis, and written several articles, one of which I was privileged to be able to co-author with her. It is crime analysis and cognitive facts and looking at how analysts use data in their jobs, how they are applied to policing, along with what is the cultural and organizational role of analysts within the police services in Canada. Because there isn't a significant body of research around analysts in Canadian police work.

 

Pat Perdue  25:34

So cool. And do you watch like, NCIS? 

 

Camie Condon  25:39

No, no.

 

Pat Perdue  25:41

Why is that?

 

Camie Condon  25:43

I'm just not into the fiction stuff on TV. It’s too over the top. And having worked for the police service for a long time it when you tell someone you're an analyst, they're like, oh, so like, you spray that luminal all over? No, no. Or the other one where the woman who always had the headset on.

 

Pat Perdue  26:01

Oh, and they'd always circle back to her. Yeah, it was like clicking and she’d pull up all this information. 

 

Camie Condon  26:05

I got that. Okay, no, I don't, I don't really do that either. So it's just not real. I like the true stories, that Looming Tower book that I referenced them who actually made a six part series out of it. I gobbled up every second of that. 

 

Pat Perdue  26:23

You know, your enthusiasm and your excitement for the subject matter and deep deep knowledge, I'm sure translates really solid with your students. Dr. Cami Condon. Thank you, thank you so much for joining us on the Seneca Proud podcast. 

 

Camie Condon  26:38

Thank you. 

 

Pat Perdue  26:39

It's been great. 

 

Camie Condon  26:40

Thanks. You too. 

 

Pat Perdue  26:58

I must say I really enjoyed that conversation with Dr. Cami Condon. Pretty cool. Right? And I have to say that program sounds really neat. So, a question for you. How far into this episode were you before you hit the pause button and disabled your location tracking on your phone? I know I did. So now whoever's monitoring my whereabouts won't be able to see me going to Tim Hortons, like three times a day. So they're specifics of Dr. Condon’s program. The Crime and Intelligence Analysis degree program are in the show notes as well as a link to her company, iBRABO. And hey, you know if you have any questions about any of these programs featured on this podcast, just drop Seneca College an email, and I'm sure they'll be happy to answer any of your questions. And of course, this podcast is available anywhere you get your podcasts. Thanks for listening to the Seneca Proud podcast. I'm Pat Perdue. Stay proud Seneca