Microsoft Corp. has announced that National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency (NGA) will use its Virtual Earth platform to deliver information applications to customers. The NGA will use the Microsoft Virtual Earth platform to provide geospatial support for humanitarian, peacekeeping and national-security efforts.
The Virtual Earth platform is an integrated set of online mapping and search services that deliver imagery through easy-to-program APIs. Geospatial intelligence (GEOINT) is the exploitation and analysis of imagery and geospatial information to describe, assess and visually depict physical features and geographically referenced activities on the Earth.
"NGA is collaborating with Microsoft to accelerate the introduction of commercial virtual solutions into the GEOINT arena," said James Clapper, director of the NGA.
NGA said it would use Virtual Earth to create additional crisis response sites for future disasters in the world.
