Al-Qaeda is trying to mobilise the whole Muslim world against the West  |
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Paul Eedle, Middle East expert
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Posted on 12/12/2002 11:06:19 AM PST by JohnathanRGalt
| By Mark Ward BBC News Online technology correspondent Thursday, 12 December, 2002, 10:00 GMT |
The web is becoming a potent weapon in al-Qaeda's bid to win supporters to its causeVideos of terrorist attacks, proclamations by al-Qaeda's leaders and calls to Muslims to take action against the West are being spread by the disparate group of sites.
With net access spreading swiftly in the Middle East, the audience for the propaganda is steadily growing.
Tools of terror
"The internet is an ideal tool for a network like al-Qaeda," said Paul Eedle, a journalist and expert on the Middle East who tracks the growing number of al-Qaeda websites.
Al-Qaeda is trying to mobilise the whole Muslim world against the West
Paul Eedle, Middle East expert
"It is not a matter of a few radical sounding messages posted on the odd bulletin board," he said, "it's a very wide array of internet sites and message boards."
Mr Eedle said a distinction had to be drawn between al-Qaeda terrorists and the campaigning arm of the organisation that distributes material to sympathetic sites.
Some sites represent other terror groups and Muslim terror groups and are happy to pool resources and share information.
"Al-Qaeda has much wider ambitions than just setting off explosives," said Mr Eedle, "it is trying to mobilise the whole Muslim world against the West."
He said the sites help al-Qaeda shape perceptions of what it does and the conflict it is engendering.
Many of the sites spreading al-Qaeda's message gain credibility by demonstrating their close links with the terror group.
Mr Eedle said the context and content of the information the sites possess shows they have links with the terror group.
Propaganda tool
His opinion was echoed by Aaron Weisburd, who has spent months tracking al-Qaeda sites around the web.
He said evidence of direct links were hard to find but there was little doubt that the group was pumping out propaganda to sympathisers.
The statement by Sulaiman abu Ghaith claiming responsibility for the recent attacks in Mombassa first appeared on an al-Qaeda website, before being broadcast by the al-Jazeera television station.
Al-Qaeda sites celebrate recent attacks
The sites also publish the proclamations of al-Qaeda leaders and their denunciations of Western culture. They also host religious texts, arguments justifying terrorism, videos and audio files as well as provide chat rooms and bulletin boards where people can debate religion and politics.
Many of these online debating rooms are free of the restrictions some Middle Eastern regimes impose on their citizens.
Some al-Qaeda sympathisers use net cafes offering cheap net access. But, said Mr Eedle, many al-Qaeda supporters are educated, urban professionals who have their own PC at home.
Hidden files
Running a site sympathetic to al-Qaeda has its problems.
Mr Weisburd said many sites regularly have to move because they are found and cracked by opponents.
Cluelessness and inattentiveness are widely distributed and abundant resources on the worldwide web
Aaraon Weisburd, internet expert
One such site, called alneda, now shows a graphic saying it is "Hacked, tracked and now owned by the USA".
Although the sites move regularly, informal networks exist to pass on details of where sites have moved to.
Often they have to move because the company hosting the site decides it no longer want to be associated with the group.
To protect their anonymity most operators of al-Qaeda sites prefer to use net service and hosting providers in the West because it is easier to hide where resources are abundant.
Many site operators actively seek out vulnerable hosts and secretly install their web pages until they are detected and deleted, said Mr Weisburd.
Often they can remain active for months before they are noticed and removed.
"Cluelessness and inattentiveness are widely distributed and abundant resources on the worldwide web," he said.
I really did say this:
Cluelessness and inattentiveness are widely distributed and abundant resources on the worldwide web |
| Aaraon Weisburd, internet expert |
The BBC interviewed me prior to running this story. I thought it worthwhile to post here what I actually said, so you can compare it to what they said I said. So:
Hi Mark,
I'm a little pressed for time at the moment, but here's my off-the-cuff comments:
Is al Qaida itself actually making use of the internet and web sites? Based on some months of study, I'd have to say yes.
Are various sites 'directly' linked to al Qaida? Hard to say given the nature of such organizations. But in a number of cases, the answer also seems to be yes. Of note is the site formerly known as 'al Neda' which now pops up from time to time on various hijacked web sites. (They used to have their own domain name alneda.com, but lost it to an American pornagrapher earlier this year). You will find information about this in the archives of my own site, as well as elsewhere (Wired.com, for example). They quite literally scour the web looking for vulnerable servers (there are many thousands at any given moment), 'hijack' the targeted server, and install their site in an obscure subdirectory on a legitimate site. I've documented this on a number of occasions, most recently last Friday. And the answer to the question: "don't the legitimate owners of a site notice that someone else is using their site and server?" is a resounding "No." Cluelessness and inattentiveness are widely distributed and abundant resources on the World Wide Web. This is a corollary to the issue of vulnerable web servers.
Sites moving frequently: my own method involves approaching the ISP and politely asking them to drop the particular client. This is effective perhaps 50% of the time. Sometimes things get rather more heated, when an ISP fails to see what is wrong with hosting a web site for terrorist organization. On other occasions, various governmental agencies may want a site to stay up for ease of surveillance. There is no consensus as to the best approach. I represent the body of opinion that more can be learned by watching sites move than by simply watching them. The act of moving a web site forces the site's sponsors to expose themselves far more than simply maintaining an established site.
Aaron
Hezb-e-Islami
One cannot help but think that armies of techno-geeks at US intelligence agencies are worming into these websites, and, coming up with phony websites to lure in potential terrorists. Who really knows? We sure as hell don't.
Hezb-e-Islami
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