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A keyboard war on terror
Web detectives say they pose as terrorist insiders
Shadowy group's work has saved lives, member says

8/8/04 Toronto Star
BOB MITCHELL
STAFF REPORTER

NORWOOD—As an unemployed computer software designer, Brent Astley has nothing but time on his hands. But he says he has never been busier.

From the loft of his 100-year-old renovation-in-progress home in this small town about 150 kilometres northeast of Toronto, Astley heads an international band of cyber sleuths known as the 7Seas Global Intelligence Team.

Gaining the trust of terrorists by posing as like-minded people, the group has been able to use its Internet detective work to gather sensitive information shared with government and law enforcement agencies in the U.S., Canada and elsewhere.

The deliberately shadowy group also played a key role in the arrest of a U.S. National Guardsman who faces an Aug. 16 court martial in Washington state, accused of offering to provide military information to terrorists.

"I spend about 16 hours a day on my computer doing this," said Astley, 44, who otherwise lives a normal life with his wife, three children, two dogs and a cat. "I've got the knots in the back of my neck to prove it."

Members, which also include a lawyer, economist, security expert, small-town judge, real estate agent and a former private detective, have been operating since January, 2003, passing information about terrorists and other suspect groups such as white supremacists to agencies such as the FBI, U.S. Navy, Secret Service and RCMP.

But as he scans a pro-Al Qaeda website using his well-worn laptop, Astley remains guarded in what he can or wants to say about his highly secretive group.

"Our real recent stuff is still in progress, so I can't talk about it, but I know that information that we have provided to agencies has saved lives," said Astley, who claims that 7Seas recently passed sensitive information on to the U.S. Navy that resulted in a redeployment of some vessels that had been targeted.

On July 4, the U.S. State Department issued a travel warning for Bahrain, advising all non-essential employees and their families to leave the Persian Gulf state, citing information received about extremists planning attacks on U.S. interests. Bahrain is headquarters for the U.S. Navy's 5th Fleet.

7Seas' existence became public in May, in a preliminary hearing into charges laid against an officer at Fort Lewis, near Tacoma, Wash., who is charged with planning to pass military secrets to the enemy once he was deployed to Iraq. Spc. Ryan Anderson, 26, a tank driver, was arrested during an FBI sting on Feb. 12, a month before he was to leave for the Middle East.

Shannon Rossmiller, a member of Astley's group and a municipal judge in Conrad, Mont., provided information that led to Anderson's arrest, and she is expected to be a key witness.

Anderson thought he was e-mailing an Islamic extremist when he allegedly inquired about joining a terrorist organization, but he was actually talking with Rossmiller, 34, a mother of three who was posing as an angry young Muslim man with a deep-rooted hatred of the U.S.

Posing as an Algerian with ties to that country's outlawed Armed Islamic Group, Rossmiller drew out Anderson with 27 e-mails over four months, in which he allegedly called himself Amir Abdul Rashid.

Rossmiller says the Anderson case has drawn unwanted attention to 7Seas, especially herself, and acknowledges that it brings an added element of danger to her work with the group.

"We have to be prepared to take some risks if we hope to be effective in this undertaking that we firmly believe in," Rossmiller said. "I fought pretty hard to keep this (7Seas) from going public, but lost that battle. So now, I'm selective on the people I talk to about it."

Still, she figures the publicity has not significantly compromised the group's effectiveness.

Credibility is an issue frequently raised. She says corroboration about credibility in some kind of a policy statement by authorities "isn't really what we're looking for or expect."

However, she said, besides work the group has done on its own initiative, U.S. Navy intelligence has made specific requests for certain information, "as have other organizations."

"We were a really nice covert secret until this Anderson case came about. There's no textbook for this — it's been invented on the fly. What works, works. What doesn't, doesn't," Rossmiller said.

Group members work within the laws of their countries, "which is the only way to maintain our credibility," she said.

The FBI admits to being familiar with the organization.

"The FBI is aware of this group but we can't comment on their specific role," FBI spokesperson Megan Baroska told the Star. "However, the FBI does encourage individuals to report any suspicious activity they see."

Astley said the Anderson case doesn't compare to some of the "far more interesting" intelligence the group has passed on.

"People would be surprised and shocked if they knew about some of the information that we have managed to provide."

Astley met Rossmiller and the others on a chat line after the terrorist attacks of Sept 11, 2001. Discovering their common interests, they spent months "checking each other out" before forming a group. Four live in the U.S., one each in Canada, Singapore and Australia.

"After 9/11, I watched all the news sites, but I needed to know more and discovered there was a multitude of information on the web," said Astley.

7Seas has a public website explaining itself, but the work is done through a network of non-public sites, hidden by an elaborate series of firewalls and proxy sites.

"I'd love to call this a job, but I can't. It's more of a deadly serious hobby," Astley said. "It's become a labour of love for us. We're driven by a calling.

"We essentially try to keep an eye on terrorists' activities on the Internet by monitoring their sites and forums. We go from passively observing to actively engaging individuals whom we have identified as being highly credible.

"We watch them to see what they're posting and how they're treated by other people (using the forums) and the respect they're given by others, and that all adds to their credibility."

Astley won't reveal their methods, other than to say that they make use of sophisticated computer techniques, including language translation to Arabic, to convince Al Qaeda sympathizers they're on their side and draw out information that may be useful. In essence, they pretend they're Al Qaeda, with fictitious names, careers and lives. False proxies are created to suggest their e-mails are coming from the Middle East.

"Part of the game is to establish personalities that are compatible to their own," Astley said. "They think that we are one of them. They have no idea where we're even living. These people are generally in the Middle East, in Pakistan, although there is one in Montreal."

Information gathered doesn't necessarily lead to arrests.

"It might be as simple as having targets, whether human or ships or whatever, not being where they're supposed to be."

Last summer, Astley claims, information about a possible attack on U.S. Secretary of State Donald Rumsfeld's convoy was thwarted when he was in Iraq.

"We forwarded a threat against him ... He wasn't harmed."

Astley admits it took a while for the group to earn credibility with agencies such as the FBI.

"We sounded like Internet geeks at first, and I can't blame anybody for thinking that," he said. "They took our calls and we were treated as serious as we deserved at the time, but now we have gained credibility and now we're taken much more seriously."

Astley regrets that some early warnings weren't heeded. .

"We had information about the Riyadh bombings (in May, 2003) and we submitted it, but the authorities didn't act quick enough," Astley said.

In a news bulletin released by the group the same day, 7Seas said that while the warnings weren't specific as to the target or number of bombs, intelligence they obtained weeks earlier identified the location and approximate timing.

Astley doesn't claim 7Seas "knows everything" or can predict the next attack. "Certainly, there will be another terrorist attack," he said. "The planning is likely well under way, but it won't be where it's expected. We're building to something, and I wouldn't be surprised to see something significant happen before the end of the summer."

In recent weeks, Astley said, he has noticed "increased chatter" in pro-Al Qaeda forums, calling for attacks during the Olympics and the U.S. political party conventions.

"But I don't believe anything will happen ... It will happen when our guard is let down. It will be a target of opportunity," Astley said. "But in a sense, the terrorists have still achieved their goals because of all of the hundreds of millions of dollars that is being spent on security for the Olympics and the presidential conventions."

Although the group could use more members, it isn't recruiting. "Frankly, it's too dangerous, because we know there are people who would want to join us only so they could infiltrate our organization," Astley said.

"There are a lot of good people out there who no doubt would be able to help us, but one wrong person could be very dangerous."

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