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  3. Wild Bill Donovan would have loved the Internet. The American spymaster who built the Office of Strategic Services in the World

Wild Bill Donovan would have loved the Internet. The American spymaster who built the Office of Strategic Services in the World

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问题     Wild Bill Donovan would have loved the Internet. The American spymaster who built the Office of Strategic Services in the World War II and later laid the roots for the CIA was fascinated with information. Donovan believed in using whatever tools came to hand in the "great game" of espionage—spying as a "profession". These days the Net, which has already remade pastimes as buying books and sending mail, is reshaping Donovan’s vocation as well.
    The last revolution isn’t simply a matter of gentlemen reading other gentlemen’s e-mail. That kind of electronic spying has been going on for decades. In the past three or four years, the World Wide Web has given birth to a whole industry of point-and-click spying. The spooks call it "open source intelligence", and as the Net grows, it is becoming increasingly influential. In 1995 the CIA held a contest to see who could compile the most data about Burundi. The winner, by a large margin, was a tiny Virginia company called Open-Source Solutions, whose clear advantage was its mastery of the electronic world.
    Among the firms making the biggest splash in the new world is Straitford, Inc., a private intelligence-analysis firm based in Austin, Texas. Straitford makes money by selling the results of spying (covering nations from Chile to Russia) to corporations like energy-services firm McDermott International. Many of its predictions are available online at "www.straitford.com."
    Straitford president George Friedman says he sees the online world as a kind of mutually reinforcing tool for both information collection and distribution, a spymaster’s dream. Last week his firm was busy vacuuming up data bits from the far corners of the world and predicting a crisis in Ukraine. "As soon as that report runs, we’ll suddenly get 500 new internet sign-ups from Ukraine," says Friedman, a former political science professor. "And we’ll hear back from some of them." Open-source spying does have its risks, of course, since it can be difficult to tell good information from bad. That’s where Straitford earns its keep.
    Friedman relies on a lean staff with twenty in Austin. Several of his staff members have military intelligence backgrounds. He sees the firm’s outsider status as the key to its success. Straitford’s briefs don’t sound like the usual Washington back-and-forthing, whereby agencies avoid dramatic declarations on the chance they might be wrong. Straitford, says Friedman, takes pride in its independent voice.
Straitford is most proud of its ______.
选项 A、official status
B、nonconformist image
C、efficient staff
D、military background
答案B
解析 本题可参照文章的最后一段。从中可知，Friedman依靠的是奥斯汀的20名员工中的少数几个人。他的员工中有几名有军事情报背景。他把公司“局外人”的状况看成是其成功的关键。Straitford公司的情报简讯不像华盛顿的那样扑朔迷离，因为政府机构避免发表惹注目的言论，以防出错；Friedman说，Straitford公司以其与众不同的言论而自豪。由此可知：Straitford引以为豪的就是它不受约束。B项与文章的意思相符，因此B项为正确答案。
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