Terrorists turn to online chat rooms to evade U.S.

Japan Times ^ | 08/15/2013 | Adam Goldman

[TexGrill]

WASHINGTON – Al-Qaida fighters have been using secretive chat rooms and encrypted Internet message boards for planning and coordinating attacks — including the threatened if vague plot that U.S. officials say closed 19 diplomatic posts across Africa and the Middle East for more than a week.

It’s highly unlikely that al-Qaida’s top leader, Ayman al-Zawahri, or his chief lieutenant in Yemen, Nasser al-Wahishi, were personally part of the Internet chatter or, given the intense manhunt for both by U.S. spy agencies, that they ever go online or pick up the phone to discuss terrorist plots, experts say.

But the unspecified call to arms by the al-Qaida leaders, using a multilayered subterfuge to pass messages from couriers to tech-savvy underlings to attackers, provoked a quick reaction by the U.S. to protect Americans in far-flung corners of the world where the terrorist network is evolving into regional hubs.

For years, extremists have used online forums to share information and drum up support, and over the past decade they have developed systems that blend encryption programs with anonymity software to hide their tracks. Jihadist technology may now be so sophisticated and secretive, experts say, that many communications avoid detection by National Security Agency programs that were specifically designed to uncover terrorist plots.

[TexGrill]

Global PRISM tip

[bunkerhill7]

U.S. citizens turn to online chat rooms to evade NSA.

[Absolutely Nobama]

Can’t escape PRISM.