For years, the search for accessible information on the Internet, commonly known as OSINT (Open Source Intelligence), has prospered in relative legal opacity. Massive collections, wild indexing, without control farms, the sector has long worked as a gray area, tolerated for lack of a clear frame. This era is coming to an end.
Under the combined effect of the GDPR, the NIS2 directive and the Dora regulation, Europe now imposes an in -depth transformation of cybersurveillance and strategic intelligence practices. The exploitation of open data no longer escapes the requirements of loyalty, loyalty and proportionality which govern the entire processing of digital information.
The border between accessible and usable
Contrary to popular belief, the public nature of information gives no automatic right to its collection or use. European law clearly distinguishes technical accessibility from the legality of exploitation. Any information, whether it comes from the Clear Web, the Deep Web or the Dark Web, can be protected by specific rights: personal data, copyright, business secret, protected databases.
Consequently, access to a poorly secure database, even open without password, can lead to the qualification of fraudulent access, illegitimate maintenance or illegal extraction within the meaning of the French penal code. The argument of technical availability no longer constitutes sufficient defense in the face of the risk of sanction.
The Active Compliance Age
The regulatory hardening, far from bridling any watch and cybersecurity activity, requires rethinking methods. The collection of information must now rely on search engines operating in a strict legal framework: indexing without intrusion, absence of scrapping or bypassing security, traceability of sources.
The use of aggressive techniques, such as massive automation, crawling without authorization, or access to protected forums, directly exhibits providers and their customers at criminal risk. Likewise, the use of databases made up of leaks or data flights, even chopped, can be assimilated to digital concealment.
In this new context, compliance becomes a competitive advantage as much as a legal obligation. Client companies must require their service providers not only results, but also guarantees on the legality of the means employed.
A new responsibility for intelligence actors on the Internet
The contractual mandate between the sponsor company and its service provider now plays a key role. It must specify the authorized perimeters, the typologies of data sought, processing procedures, and integrate specific RGPD conformity clauses.
Responsibility does not stop at the supplier’s door, a French company using a foreign service provider operating outside the European framework can see its own responsibility engaged in the event of illegal collection. The principle is clear: what is illegal in France remains, even if the act has been committed from abroad.
Faced with this evolution, the European ecosystem of bones and the Threat Intelligence begins a deep mutation. Wild collection practices give way to supervised, auditable and legally controlled approaches. This professionalization, still a stammering, draws the future of a sector where the ethics of collection will become as decisive as the quality of the analyzes delivered.
