Measurement and Signature Intelligence - Understanding "measurement" and "signature"

Understanding "measurement" and "signature"

In the context of MASINT, "measurement" relates to the finite metric parameters of targets. "Signature" covers the distinctive features of phenomena, equipment, or objects as they are sensed by the collection instrument(s). The signature is used to recognize the phenomenon (the equipment or object) once its distinctive features are detected. MASINT measurement searches for differences from known norms, and characterizes the signatures of new phenomena. For example, the first time a new rocket fuel exhaust is measured, it would be a deviation from a norm. When the properties of that exhaust are measured, such as its thermal energy, spectral analysis of its light (i.e., spectrometry), etc., those properties become a new signature in the MASINT database.

MASINT has been described as a "non-literal" discipline. It feeds on a target's unintended emissive byproducts, or "trails"—the spectral, chemical or RF emissions an object leaves behind. These trails form distinctive signatures, which can be exploited as reliable discriminators to characterize specific events or disclose hidden targets."

While there are specialized MASINT sensors, much of the MASINT discipline involves analysis of information from other sensors. For example, a sensor may provide information on a radar beam, collected as part of Electronics intelligence (ELINT) gathering mission. Incidental characteristics recorded such as the "spillover" of the main beam (side lobes), or the interference its transmitter produces would come under MASINT.

MASINT specialists themselves struggle with providing simple explanations of their field. One attempt calls it the “CSI” of the intelligence community, in imitation of the television series CSI: Crime Scene Investigation. This emphasizes how MASINT depends on a great many sciences to interpret data.

Another possible definition calls it "astronomy except for the direction of view." The allusion here is to observational astronomy being a set of techniques that do remote sensing looking away from the earth (contrasted with how MASINT employs remote sensing looking toward the earth). Astronomers make observations in multiple electromagnetic spectra, ranging through radio waves, infrared, visible, and ultraviolet light, into the X-ray spectrum and beyond. They correlate these multispectral observations and create hybrid, often “false-color” images to give a visual representation of wavelength and energy, but much of their detailed information is more likely a graph of such things as intensity and wavelength versus viewing angle.