Applied OPSEC
Analytical Method and Field Application — the complete practicum.
SEC-06 is the full analytical practicum for operational security. Eight lessons take you through the complete OPSEC five-step process and then pressure-test it against realistic scenarios — from identifying what you actually need to protect, through threat and vulnerability analysis, to a written countermeasure plan built on your own household’s real exposure. This is not an awareness course. It produces documented, actionable output.
SEC-02: Know What You’re Showing, or equivalent familiarity with OPSEC principles. Students new to security should complete SEC-02 first.
The Eight Lessons
The five-step analytical cycle, why sequence is mandatory, and what each step produces. Introduces Worksheet 1-A: your first-draft critical information baseline.
How to identify Essential Elements of Friendly Information (EEFI), apply the adversary test, and produce a finalized Critical Information List of fewer than 12 items.
Building a realistic threat picture: adversary tiers, capability versus intent, and mapping the collection disciplines each adversary can use against your critical information.
Cataloging every observable indicator that reveals your critical information, and solving the aggregation problem — why safe-seeming details are dangerous in combination.
Systematic audit of your digital exposure: platform inventory, username linkage, EXIF and metadata, device emissions, and cross-referencing every finding against your CIL.
Property, vehicle, routine, and disposal signatures — what an external observer sees, which indicators are broadcast passively, and how physical patterns combine into exploitable profiles.
Converting your risk findings into a written countermeasure plan: action, control, and deception measures, prioritization matrix, digital and physical action tables, and a recurring review schedule.
Six realistic household and MAG scenarios that combine everything from Lessons 1–7 — work each one yourself, then reveal the analysis to check your reasoning.
How each lesson works
Doctrine first. Every concept is grounded in its source: DoDD 5205.02E, AR 530-1, JP 3-13.3, DoDM 5205.02-M. You learn why the method works, not just what the steps are.
Application second. Each lesson translates the concept into a realistic household or group security scenario, with a worked case study and a field scenario tied directly to the companion guide worksheet.
Knowledge checks. Interactive questions test application, not recall. Correct answers include the full reasoning. Wrong answers direct you back to the relevant section.
Output required. Every lesson assigns a worksheet. Complete all seven and you have a working OPSEC baseline document for your household or group.
This course is designed for individuals, families, and Mutual Assistance Groups who want to move beyond general security awareness into a structured, documented analytical process. It is suitable for students with no prior intelligence background, but it requires genuine engagement — the worksheets produce real output only if completed honestly. Estimated completion: 10–12 hours across 1–2 weeks of self-paced study.