← Back to PlatformThe language of
Glossary
The language of
open-source intelligence.
56 terms across maritime, aviation, satellite, sanctions, compliance, cyber and investigative doctrine — defined in plain English, cross-linked to the tools and case studies where they matter.
A
8 terms- ACLEDGeopolitics
- Armed Conflict Location & Event Data Project — academic dataset of geocoded political violence and protest events used in conflict mapping.
- ADS-BAviation
- Automatic Dependent Surveillance-Broadcast. Aircraft transponder broadcast of position, altitude, velocity and ICAO 24-bit address. Backbone of civilian flight tracking.
- ADS-B OffAviation
- When an aircraft disables its transponder mid-flight to avoid surveillance — a strong indicator of sanction evasion or covert operation.
- AISMaritime
- Automatic Identification System. VHF maritime transponder protocol broadcasting MMSI, position, course, speed and destination. The primary live data source for vessel tracking.
- AIS GapMaritime
- A period during which a vessel’s AIS transponder is intentionally off. Routinely flagged in dark-fleet investigations.
- AMLCompliance
- Anti-Money Laundering — regulatory framework requiring identification of beneficial owners and screening against sanctions and PEP lists.
- Anchorage ZoneMaritime
- A designated maritime area for vessels to anchor outside port. STS transfers occurring outside designated anchorages are a known red flag.
- AIS SpoofingMaritime
- Falsification of AIS broadcasts to misrepresent a vessel’s identity, position or course.
B
2 terms- Bellingcat ToolkitOSINT
- A widely cited directory of free OSINT tools maintained by the Bellingcat investigative collective.
- Breach DataCyber
- Credentials, PII or business data exposed in a data breach. Indexed by services such as HIBP and IntelX for exposure scoring.
C
5 terms- CallsignAviation
- A flight identifier broadcast in ADS-B messages. Often used together with the ICAO 24-bit address to build pattern-of-life baselines.
- CensysCyber
- Internet-wide scanner indexing exposed services, TLS certificates and hosts — used for infrastructure attribution.
- Change DetectionSatellite
- Side-by-side comparison of two satellite acquisitions to surface infrastructure, vessel or terrain changes between two dates.
- CDDCompliance
- Customer Due Diligence — the regulatory baseline of identity verification and risk profiling for new counter-parties.
- ChokepointMaritime
- A geographic bottleneck through which a high share of global trade transits — e.g. Strait of Hormuz, Bab-el-Mandeb, Malacca, Suez, Panama.
D
2 terms- Dark FleetMaritime
- Vessels engaged in sanctioned trade that obscure their identity through AIS spoofing, flag-hopping or shell ownership.
- Dark WebCyber
- Tor-hosted and other anonymised networks hosting marketplaces, leaks and threat-actor disclosures. Indexed via partners such as IntelX.
E
4 terms- EDGARCorporate
- Electronic Data Gathering, Analysis and Retrieval — the SEC system housing US public-company filings.
- Entity ResolutionInvestigation
- The process of reconciling multiple data records that refer to the same real-world entity — vessel, person, company or aircraft.
- EEZMaritime
- Exclusive Economic Zone — 200-nautical-mile band where a coastal state holds rights over natural resources.
- EquasisMaritime
- Public information system listing vessel ownership, management chain, classification and inspection history.
F
2 terms- Flag of ConvenienceMaritime
- A registry under which a vessel is flagged primarily to obtain regulatory leniency — common in sanction-evasion patterns.
- FOIAOSINT
- Freedom of Information Act — US legal instrument for requesting federal-agency records, frequently used in investigative journalism.
G
3 terms- GDELTGeopolitics
- Global Database of Events, Language and Tone — open dataset of media-derived event records, refreshed every 15 minutes.
- GEOINTDoctrine
- Geospatial Intelligence — the integration of imagery, geospatial information and human geography to produce situational understanding.
- Graph InvestigationInvestigation
- A pivot-driven investigation methodology where entities and their relationships are explored on a graph canvas.
H
2 terms- HIBPCyber
- Have I Been Pwned — authoritative database of compromised credentials and breach exposures.
- HUMINTDoctrine
- Human Intelligence — information collected from human sources. Out of scope for SENTINEL GIP.
I
3 terms- ICAO 24-bit AddressAviation
- A unique aircraft identifier broadcast in every ADS-B message, used to resolve type, operator and country.
- IMO NumberMaritime
- A 7-digit identifier permanently assigned to a vessel hull by the International Maritime Organization — survives renaming and reflagging.
- IntelXCyber
- Search engine indexing public leaks, paste sites and onion archives — primary corpus for breach attribution.
L
2 terms- LandsatSatellite
- NASA/USGS optical satellite programme — provides the longest continuous Earth-observation archive (since 1972) for long-term change detection.
- LiDARSatellite
- Light Detection and Ranging — pulsed-laser 3D-mapping technology, occasionally combined with SAR for infrastructure analysis.
M
2 terms- MASINTDoctrine
- Measurement and Signature Intelligence — technical sensor intelligence (e.g. SAR signatures, radio fingerprinting).
- MMSIMaritime
- Maritime Mobile Service Identity — a 9-digit identifier broadcast in AIS messages. Country code embedded in the first 3 digits (MID).
O
5 terms- OFAC SDNSanctions
- Office of Foreign Assets Control — Specially Designated Nationals list. Cornerstone US sanctions regime.
- OpenCorporatesCorporate
- Largest open database of company records — 230 million entities across 140 jurisdictions.
- OpenSanctionsSanctions
- Curated aggregator of sanctions, PEP and watchlist data — 230+ source datasets reconciled into a single graph.
- OSINTDoctrine
- Open-Source Intelligence — the production of intelligence from publicly available information.
- OpenSky NetworkAviation
- Academic-grade open ADS-B receiver network providing historical and real-time aircraft data.
P
3 terms- Pattern of LifeInvestigation
- Statistical baseline of an entity’s recurring movements and behaviours, used to surface anomalies.
- PEPCompliance
- Politically Exposed Person — an individual entrusted with prominent public function, requiring enhanced due diligence.
- PIICompliance
- Personally Identifiable Information — data points that can identify a natural person. Subject to data-protection regulation.
R
1 term- ReflaggingMaritime
- Switching a vessel’s flag of registration — frequently used to obscure ownership or escape sanctions enforcement.
S
7 terms- SAR (Synthetic-Aperture Radar)Satellite
- Active microwave imaging that produces high-resolution imagery in any weather, day or night. Sentinel-1 is the workhorse SAR satellite.
- Sanctions ScreeningCompliance
- Cross-referencing identifiers against official sanctions and watchlists. SENTINEL GIP screens against 7 regimes daily.
- Sentinel-1Satellite
- European Space Agency C-band SAR satellite constellation — all-weather, day/night Earth observation.
- Sentinel-2Satellite
- European Space Agency 10 m multispectral optical satellite constellation — 5-day revisit at the equator.
- ShodanCyber
- Search engine for internet-connected devices — frequently used in infrastructure attribution.
- SIGINTDoctrine
- Signals Intelligence — intelligence derived from communications and electronic signals. Out of scope for SENTINEL GIP.
- STS TransferMaritime
- Ship-to-ship transfer of cargo at sea. Outside designated anchorages, a leading indicator of sanction circumvention.
T
1 term- TECHINTDoctrine
- Technical Intelligence — exploitation of foreign material to derive technical insight. Out of scope for SENTINEL GIP.
U
2 terms- UBOCompliance
- Ultimate Beneficial Owner — the natural person who ultimately controls a legal entity. Required disclosure under most AML regimes.
- UN SanctionsSanctions
- The United Nations Security Council consolidated sanctions list — adopted under Chapter VII of the UN Charter.
V
1 term- Vessel DossierMaritime
- Court-ready compiled report containing vessel identifiers, ownership chain, AIS history, sanctions status and supporting citations.
W
1 term- WEBINTDoctrine
- Web Intelligence — open-source intelligence derived specifically from web content, social media and online communities.
Apply the vocabulary to a live investigation.
Every term on this page is operational inside SENTINEL GIP. Pivot from an MMSI to a UBO, from an ADS-B callsign to a Sentinel-1 acquisition, in a single workspace.