Saturday, May 17, 2008

Data...

On March first, Colombian troops raided a FARC camp, killing 26 guerilleros (and causing a minor scuffle with Ecuador and Venezuela).
They also secured lots of computer files just described by Interpol. Here´s what they found:
"más de 600 gigas de datos, 37.862 documentos escritos, 452 hojas de cálculo, 210.888 imágenes, 22.481 páginas web, 7989 direcciones individuales de correo electrónico, 10.537 archivos de multimedia de sonido y video, y 983 archivos encriptados"

Two thoughts:
1. Studying criminal groups, terrorists groups, or rebel groups (I suppose the FARC have something of each) has become something of a fad in the social sciences. How cool would it be to get access to those 452 spreadsheets to understand the FARC's finances and logistics? I don't think it's going to happen, but making them available to academics would also (hopefully) lead to a better understanding of the FARC which should be in the Colombian government's interest?

2. 210888 pictures? I suppose they could all be images of tactical sites etc. But given that a rebel camp is probably one of the higher concentrations of testosterone you can find, my best guess would be something else...

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