Al Qaeda operatives may be comfortable crossing ancient deserts and employing guerrilla tactics, but they're also adept at using with the Web and computers.
The arrest of alleged Pakistani terrorist Mohammad Naeem Noor Khan, captured this summer with 51 optical discs and three computers chock-full of terror intelligence, is the most recent indicator of just how technically adept terror groups have become.
Computer and terrorist experts say Khan is one of many central nodes in a decentralized network of terrorists who have been using the Internet and cutting-edge technology as a way to organize terror campaigns and promote their cause online.
"In the post-September 11 climate, Islamic extremists see the Internet as a vital tool to communicate, indoctrinate, and spread their message," says Mark Rasch, former Justice Department computer crimes prosecutor and current chief security counsel for Solutionary, a managed computer security provider.
"They are very tech savvy and they know how to avoid being caught," Rasch adds.
Double-Edged Sword
But while terrorists can work invisibly online, Khan's arrest illustrates that technology can be turned against them. Technology can make it easier to conceal information and communicate covertly using digital tools such as encryption. But it also leaves digital trails of evidence. For example, police hunted down the suspected kidnappers of Wall Street Journal journalist Daniel Pearl by tracking e-mail that was designed to be anonymous.
Computer intelligence found on Khan's computers was instrumental in the arrests of Pakistani and UK terror suspects. Its discovery is credited for disrupting planned terror strikes in the United States. Subsequent arrests in Britain, which stem from intelligence gathered from Khan, led investigators to confiscate more than 1000 discs, according to reports from the New York Times.
"Unfortunately, there is no single computer mastermind behind Al Qaeda, just as there is no single Al Qaeda group," says Gabriel Weimann, a terrorism and communications expert and author of The Theater of Terror. He says Khan was one of many Al Qaeda information touchstones spread across the globe and connected by the Internet.
For the past ten years, dissidents from the Middle East, Chechnya, and Latin America have used the Internet to further their cause, says Josh Devon, a senior analyst at the SITE Institute, a terrorism research group that monitors the Web. Al Qaeda is fundamentally no different, he says.
The Middle East Media Research Institute (MEMRI) is tracking nine "pro-Al Qaeda" Web sites out of a watch list of 25 Islamist Web sites and message forums.
Al Qaeda often uses Web sites to urge terrorists to kill Americans and to publish messages allegedly from Osama bin Laden, MEMRI reports. "These sites are often used to help create public lists of who and what to target and in what order," Rasch says.
Tech Tools Aid Terrorists
But the proliferation of the Web and the availability of more powerful and affordable graphics and multimedia processing tools have dramatically increased Al Qaeda's ability to broadcast its message. It is using the Internet for training and outreach much more than was possible even five years ago, according to experts.
When Islamic extremists broadcast the executions of Nick Berg in Iraq and Paul Johnson in Saudi Arabia, those videos were made using standard CD and DVD authoring software.
"Al Qaeda has proven it can play the media game very effectively," Devon says.
Al Qaeda also knows how to effectively use covert tools like stenography (secret messages inserted inside written messages or even image files), anonymous e-mail accounts, and encrypted messages, Rasch says.
Devon says that ever since the United States destroyed Al Qaeda training and recruitment camps in Afghanistan during the 2001 Operation Enduring Freedom campaign, the virtual equivalent of Al Qaeda training camps have been growing online.
The SITE Institute has tracked how-to sites that tell how to create a safe house, how to clean a rocket-propelled grenade launcher, and what do you do if you get captured.
"Al Qaeda's online operations in many ways parallel the Internet itself," Devon says. "Like the Internet, Al Qaeda is a decentralized network of independently operating cells."
Even with international cooperation to shut these sites down, experts say, Islamic extremists are succeeding in organizing online where they are failing in the real world.
The Cyberterror Threat
Fears of cyberterrorists unleashing computer worms, denial of service attacks, and network sabotage may be overstated, say some computer experts. The U.S. government has warned that terrorists could bring down the Internet or cripple critical infrastructure such as telecommunications and electric power grids; oil, gas, and water systems; and transportation and emergency services.
Computer experts point out that critical systems don't run on the Internet, but are instead based on secure networks.
The Department of Homeland Security and the FBI both report they have seen no Internet-based terror attack to date. That's not to say the DHS isn't ready. The agency runs the National Cyber Security Division in partnership with Carnegie Mellon's United States Computer Emergency Response Team (US-CERT).
Anti-Terror Tools
The FBI, Secret Service, and DHS all decline to comment on their methods and procedures for tracking terrorists online.
But, regarding security closer to home, the DHS and FBI both say they are encouraged by a recent Federal Communications Commission ruling barring companies from offering voice over Internet Protocol phone service without providing backdoors for wiretapping access by law enforcement agencies.
FBI spokesperson Joe Parris says the Patriot Act has been a boon to anti-terrorist efforts. The Patriot Act's data-gathering aspects include fewer restrictions on law enforcement, less judicial oversight, and less public accountability for surveillance of electronic communications--which all have drawn criticism from privacy advocates. But Parris says the Patriot Act is far from a silver bullet when it comes to domestic anti-terrorism efforts.
Both the DHS and FBI are painfully aware that U.S. laws are limited to U.S. jurisdiction. Meanwhile, beyond the borders, Al Qaeda seems impervious and unfettered by U.S. laws. But technology is another subject.
Agencies claim that using terrorists' tech tools against them deters even Osama bin Laden. Intelligence agencies report Al Qaeda's leader has long ceased using electronic communications. He prefers to send and receive messages through human couriers--a method sure to slow his global terrorist activities.
