The newspaper quoted "senior U.S. intelligence officials" as saying the money transfers, which began more than five years ago, have been used to finance several terrorist acts by bin Laden.1993?
The Bergen Record
Bin Laden is said to have advantage in communications
Osama bin Laden, the Saudi exile wanted for allegedly masterminding the bombing of two U.S. embassies in East Africa, has better communications technology than the United States, according to the director of the National Security Agency.
Gen. Mike Hayden, who heads the U.S. supersecret intelligence agency, said in a rare interview that Bin Laden was able to orchestrate almost simultaneous bombings without NSA detection because he has more resources.
"Osama bin Laden has at his disposal the wealth of a $3 trillion a year telecommunications industry that he can rely on," Hayden told CBS' "60 Minutes II" in an interview that will be broadcast Tuesday night. "That's why. He has better technology."
Hayden said his agency is "behind the curve in keeping up with the global telecommunications revolution."
Prosecutors have portrayed the 1998 blasts at U.S. embassies in Nairobi, Kenya, and Dar es Salaam, Tanzania, as part of a worldwide plot by Bin Laden. Twelve Americans were among the 224 people killed. Four men are standing trial in New York in the plot.
Later in the interview, Hayden recounted how a telecommunications failure within the agency made Americans around the world more vulnerable to terrorists for three days in January 2000. All the agency's computers at headquarters had failed.
"NSA headquarters was brain-dead. We had some residual ability at our locations around the world, but I don't want to trivialize this. This was really bad," Hayden said.
Considered the eavesdropping branch of the intelligence community, the NSA gathers information through satellites, telephone intercepts, and other methods. Not much else is known about the NSA. Employees joke that the agency's initials stand for "No Such Agency."
Did you mean to refer to reply #47 rather than #46? More than five years earlier than Oct. 1999 (date of article) would put the time frame range at between September 1993 to September 1994.