The Intersect

The Intersect is a government database of encoded information harvested from every intelligence agency in the United States, including the Central Intelligence Agency, National Security Agency, and the National Clandestine Service as of the Season Four episode Template:418.

Throughout the series, the Intersect serves as the core of the story line, after Bryce Larkin sent the First Intersect to Chuck. Various organizations strive to obtain the Intersect, or human agents who may have the Intersect intalled, commonly referred as a human Intersect.

The initial upload of the Intersect apparently took far longer than any subsequent update or download. The implication is that Chuck was receiving for what may well have been hours, since dawn arrived as the download completed.

The 2.0, by comparison, took only minutes to upload to Chuck, and updates even less time.

Government

Prototypes/ early versions:

Intersect Concept - The concept of how the Intersect works.
Intersect prototype - Intersect uploaded to Chuck as a child. (FlashBack: Template:319)
Orion's Intersect - Early Intersect Orion tested on himself.
Hartley's Intersect - Early Intersect uploaded into Agent X for undercover mission.

Main Intersects:

First Intersect - The Intersect Bryce stole and which got uploaded to Chuck's Brain for the first two seasons.
Second Intersect - Replacement for the one Bryce blew up. Built during season 1, destroyed by Fulcrum.
Intersect 2.0 - First of the second generation. Chuck uploaded it in Template:222.
Laptop Intersect - Intersect found on one of Orion's laptops. Broken but fixed by Ellie.
NCS Intersect - Intersect built by NCS in a secret area of Castle.

Enemy Intersects

Fulcrum Intersect - The Meadow branch and the Roark Intersects developed by Fulcrum.
Ring Intersect - Intersect built by The Ring, uploaded by and used by Shaw.
Intersect 3.0 - The ultimate Intersec, subsequently infected with the Omen virus by Chuck.

Intersect devices

Intersect Data Drive - A drive containing Intersect data seen in Template:203.
Intersect Overload Cartridge - Security device to destroy the Intersect 2.0.
Intersect Glasses - The different Intersect upload glasses seen throughout the series.
The Governor - The device that prevents the Intersect negative effects.
Intersect Suppression Device
Intersect Glasses - The sunglasses that Morgan Grimes, Sarah Walker & Chuck Bartowski used to upload the Intersect or its updates into their brains.
The Key - A device that can change the Intersect

Human Intersects

For more information, see Human Intersect.

Charles Bartowski - Intersect prototype, First Intersect, Fulcrum Intersect, Intersect 2.0, Laptop Intersect, & Intersect 2.0 via Intersect Glasses
Hartley Winterbottom - (Flawed) Hartley's Intersect
Stephen Bartowski - Orion's Intersect
Manoosh Depark - Intersect Glasses
Daniel Shaw - Ring Intersect, Intersect 3.0 (infected with the OMEN virus) via Intersect Glasses
Richard Noble - Laptop Intersect
Victoria Dunwoody - Laptop Intersect
Morgan Grimes - (Corrupt) Intersect 2.0 via Intersect Glasses
Sarah Walker - (Corrupt) Intersect 2.0 via Intersect Glasses

History

Following 9/11, the CIA and NSA were instructed to "play nice" and share their intelligence, in turn making it easier to track and identify threats to national security, and the manufactured Intersect is "how (they) did that." They put "every scrap of data (they) had" into the computer, and the Intersect "saw" patterns in the data that the agencies had not.

For example, Chuck describes in "Chuck Versus the Intersect" that multiple agencies had picked up information suggesting a bombing attempt against General Stanfield during the speech he was due to give, but the CIA and NSA each only had part of the picture. The Intersect cross-checked and combined both groups' intelligence to determine the full nature of the threat. Dr. Howard Busgang (code name Perseus) was one of the technicians involved in its design and development, as was Dr. Jonas Zarnow. The chief designer is Stephen J. Bartowski (code name Orion), Chuck's father.

Stephen Bartowski was apparently unaware of what the government intended to do with the Intersect, and it is not entirely clear what he originally expected or if the government had designs for the Intersect beyond creating more powerful spies. Both he and Dr. Busgang refer ominously to Stephen learning about the government's plans for the Intersect. When Stephen did learn, after completing the original Cipher, he purged his personal records and disappeared, not government or hostile agency was able to track him.

Intelligence Updates

In Template:203, Bryce leaves Chuck a pair of sunglasses equiped and designed to update a human intersect, and was coded to initiate upon recognizing Chuck's retinal pattern. The sunglasses needed the Intersect Data Drive in order perform the update to the Intersect with new intelligence.

In Template:213, Chuck is exposed to two test sequences of encoded images designed by Fulcrum in their attempt to build their own version of the Intersect, a short test sequence followed by the full test. He believes that Fulcrum programming could be in his brain, this is proved by the subsequent flashes on all his cul-de-sac neighbors, all of whom are Fulcrum agents, and none of whom prompted a flash from the Intersect when he first encountered them.

In Template:423, one of Chuck's flashes contains information on Vivian Volkoff's possible bases of operation - directly naming her in one of the encoded images. When Chuck last received an Intersect update, Vivian was not in command of Volkoff Industries, nor was she even aware of it's existence. This suggests that Chuck's Intersect is updated more frequently than shown with new data from the CIA and NSA.