FBI Suspects Terrorists Are Exploring Cyber Attacks

According to a WSJ report today, The FBI is looking at groups suspected of having links to al Qaeda who have shown an interest in mounting an attack on computer systems that control critical U.S. infrastructure.

While there is no evidence that terrorist groups have developed sophisticated cyber-attack capabilities yet, a lack of security protections in U.S. computer software increases the likelihood that terrorists could execute attacks in the future, an official warned.

If terrorists were to amass such capabilities, they would be wielded with “destructive and deadly intent,” Steven Chabinsky, deputy assistant director of the FBI’s Cyber Division, told the Senate Judiciary Committee Tuesday.

“The FBI is aware of and investigating individuals who are affiliated with or sympathetic to al Qaeda who have recognized and discussed the vulnerabilities of the U.S. infrastructure to cyber-attack,” Mr. Chabinsky told the committee, without providing details.

Such infrastructure could include power grids and transportation systems.

The control systems of U.S. infrastructure as well as money transfers are now connected directly or indirectly to the Internet. Hackers have been able to penetrate computer systems running components of the U.S. electric grid as well as divert bank transfers.

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Worrisome Al Qaeda Videos Found By FBI

The FBI has reportedly recovered two highly inflammatory Al Qaeda videos from the house of Pakistan-born Canadian, Tahawwur Hussain Rana, who was arrested last month along with another person, David Coleman Headley, a Pakistan-born American national.

The new videos were recovered from the house of 48-year-old Rana, who has been living in Chicago for nearly a decade.

Produced by the media wing of Al Qaeda, one of the videos is titled “Bombing of Denmark Embassy”.

The 54-minute DVD is narrated by Abu Yahya al-Libi, an Al Qaeda spokesman who reportedly escaped from American custody in Afghanistan.

In his presentation, al-Libi explicitly calls for violent action to retaliate against Denmark for the publication of cartoons of Prophet Mohammad by the Danish newspaper Jyllands-Posten.

According to an FBI affidavit, the DVD also prominently features video of a man who carried out a suicide car bombing of the Danish embassy in Islamabad June 2, 2008.

Rana and Headley, who are allegedly part of an Lashkar-e-Taiba plot, are said to have been ready to launch new terror attacks in India.

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Soldier Arrested After C4 Military Explosives Found At Home

An Army Special Forces soldier was arrested in Tennessee on Monday following the discovery of 100 pounds of C4 explosives outside his home. Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives agent Eric Kehn said he expects the man will face more charges related to the discovery of the explosives according to news reports on News Channel 5. Authorities say the explosives have no known link to terrorism. Video Link

The explosives were found in crates. The material was sealed in watertight containers and partially buried.

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From The Leaf Chronicle

Timothy Ryan Richards of the 5th Special Forces Group, has been charged with knowingly receiving and possessing firearms not registered to him in the National Firearms Registration and Transfer Record, according to a criminal complaint filed by the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms.

Federal and military officials searched Richards’ home early Monday morning after a pair of hunters found the C-4 plastic explosives in a field by the house, at 1880 Johnson Road, on Sunday at about 4:30 p.m.

Maj. April Olsen, 5th Group spokeswoman, said Richards was taken to the county jail and was transferred to federal custody. He was cooperating with authorities in the investigation, Olsen said.

Eric Kehn, special agent and public information officer with the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives, said the investigation is ongoing.

“Our explosive recovery effort investigation continues,” Kehn said. “He is appearing in court on some different charges, and that outlines what he’s currently being charged with.”

Those charges included Richards’ having a Saber, 5.56mm-caliber rifle with a barrel less than 16 inches long and a Swedish K .45-caliber machine gun, according to the criminal complaint filed by ATF Special Agent Jamie Smith.

The complaint was filed in U.S. District Court, Middle District of Tennessee, in Nashville.

Olsen said the search was conducted by agents from the ATF, the FBI and U.S. Army Criminal Investigations

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WRTAC Warns Of Reprisals After Radical’s Islamic Leaders Death

The Washington Times reports Federal officials have issued a warning that the shooting death of a radical Sunni Islamic leader in Michigan last week may engender retaliatory violence against law enforcement officers there as well as in the Washington area, though law enforcement officials played it down as a routine measure.

Gunfire erupted during the arrest of Ummah leader Luqman Abdullah and members of his group after Abdullah pulled a gun and shot and killed an FBI canine, according to a document obtained by The Washington Times from the Washington Regional Threat and Analysis Center (WRTAC).
FBI agents returned fire at the warehouse in Dearborn, Mich., and killed Abdullah, who was charged with selling stolen goods and illegal possession and sale of firearms.

“Abdullah’s death and associated arrests may foster resentment, violent rhetoric, and threats from Ummah adherents,” said the raw intelligence document issued by the WRTAC.

“Because of the group’s anti-law enforcement sentiments, law enforcement officers should be particularly mindful of this change in the threat environment and the possibility for retaliation,” the WRTAC said.

As for implications in the D.C. area, the WRTAC said that “Ummah sympathizers or other similar groups may be operating in the National Capital Region. Officers should be alert for possible retaliatory actions as a result of the FBI Detroit raid.”

Supervisory Special Agent Katherine W. Schweit of the FBI’s Washington office declined to comment or even confirm the contents of the document.

But, speaking in general terms, she said, “Any time an incident occurs elsewhere in the country, information is provided to all state, federal and local offices to provide them with the status, and urging them to be cautious regarding similar incidents.”

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1,600 Are Suggested Daily For Watch List

The Washington Post reported that during a 12-month period ending in March of this year, 1,600 people were recommended daily by the U.S. intelligence community to be put on the list due to ‘reasonable suspicion.’  It’s important to know,  each nomination does not necessarily represent a new individual, but may instead involve an alias or name variant for a previously named to the watchlist.

Newly released FBI data offer evidence of the broad scope and complexity of the nation’s terrorist watch list, documenting a daily flood of names nominated for inclusion to the controversial list.

During a 12-month period ended in March this year, for example, the U.S. intelligence community suggested on a daily basis that 1,600 people qualified for the list because they presented a “reasonable suspicion,” according to data provided to the Senate Judiciary Committee by the FBI in September and made public last week.

FBI officials cautioned that each nomination “does not necessarily represent a new individual, but may instead involve an alias or name variant for a previously watchlisted person.”

The ever-churning list is said to contain more than 400,000 unique names and over 1 million entries. The committee was told that over that same period, officials asked each day that 600 names be removed and 4,800 records be modified. Fewer than 5 percent of the people on the list are U.S. citizens or legal permanent residents. Nine percent of those on the terrorism list, the FBI said, are also on the government’s “no fly” list.

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Queens Man Is One of Two Accused of Trying to Supply Hezbollah

A Queens man hailed as a hero for rescuing a woman from a crazed cabbie in 2007 is one of two men who have been indicted on charges that they tried to provide the Hezbollah militia in Lebanon with weapons, ammunition and vehicles.

The men, Patrick Nayyar of Flushing and Conrad Stanisclaus Mulholland, agreed to sell guns, ammunition, vehicles, bullet-resistant vests and night vision goggles to a man who represented himself as a member of Hezbollah but was an F.B.I. informant, officials said.

Mr. Nayyar was in custody on Tuesday. Mr. Mulholland remained at large, according to prosecutors who believe he is currently in Britain, an official said.

Because Mr. Nayyar was hailed as a hero in The Daily News for having rescued a woman in a dispute with a cabdriver in 2007, his lawyer, Martin L. Schmukler said, “This doesn’t sound like real terrorism to me. This sounds like an investigation gone wild.”

In a series of meetings between July and September, Mr. Nayyar, 45, and Mr. Mulholland, 43, “provided the confidential informant with a handgun, a box of ammunition and a pickup truck, believing that the confidential informant would deliver the items” to the militant group in Lebanon, according to a statement from Preet Bharara, the United States attorney for the Southern District of New York.

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FBI Lacks Translators For Terror Intelligence

AFP cites a Justice Department audit in a report that states the FBI currently does not have enough translators to review as much as one third of the foreign-language material it collects in counter-terrorism operations.

About one third of electronic documents and one quarter of audio files collected in anti-terror probes have not been translated and reviewed, said the report by Justice Department Inspector General Glenn Fine, seen by AFP Tuesday.

“Not reviewing such material increases the risk that the FBI will not detect information in its possession that may be important to its counterterrorism and counterintelligence efforts,” it said.

According to Fine, Federal Bureau of Investigations agents translate and read all of the 4.8 million pages of text in foreign languages.

However, 14.2 million e-mail messages, or 31 percent of the total during the auditing period, have not been reviewed. Neither have 1.2 million hours of audio, or 25 percent of the 4.8 million hours collected.

Despite the demand for translators, the FBI has also seen the number of their linguists drop, going from 1,338 in March 2005 to 1,298 in September 2008.

“We found that the FBI failed to achieve its linguist hiring goals for critical languages,” the report read.

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2nd Chicago Man Tied To Terror Plot

The Chicago Tribune reports that the FBI has arrested a second Chicago man allegedly involved in an international terrorist plot with Western European targets.

The man was taken into custody Oct. 3 before he boarded a flight at O’Hare International Airport to Philadelphia, the first stop on a trip to Pakistan, where he planned to meet people with known ties to terrorist organizations that have carried out fatal attacks that resulted in the deaths of U.S. citizens, a source said. He has not been charged.

After that arrest, dozens of FBI agents from the Joint Terrorism Task Force and the Bureau of Immigration and Customs Enforcement on Oct. 18 raided a Grundy County meat-processing plant that specializes in Islamic foods.

The owner of the plant, Tahawar Hussain Rana, also of Chicago, was arrested at his North Side home the same day as the raid on First World Management Services in Kinsman, northwest of Dwight. Agents seized records from the plant, as well as a related North Side business also raided the same day, said the source, who is familiar with the investigation.

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Puerto Rico – Feds Launch Probe Into Massive Fuel Depot Fire

The cause has yet to be determined and there is at this time no indication the fire was deliberately set or related to terrorism however, more than 100 federal authorities have entered a smoldering fuel depot for the first time Sunday to investigate whether someone intentionally caused the massive explosion explosion.

On Saturday, President Barack Obama designated the U.S. Caribbean territory an emergency zone and ordered federal aid to supplement local efforts.

From The Caribbean Business PR

More than 100 federal agents entered the smoldering Caribbean Petroleum Corporation fuel depot on Sunday as the investigation began in earnest into the cause of an explosion that rocked the San Juan metro area early Friday morning and sparked a massive fire that burned for more than two days.

The blast registered 2.8 on the Richter scale and the ensuing blaze sent up an enormous tower of toxic smoke that forced the evacuation of some 1,500 residents from communities surrounding the Bayamón facility.

Marcial Orlando Félix, the head of the federal Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms (ATF) Bureau in Puerto Rico said Sunday marked the first time that ATF and FBI agents have been able to enter the site since the blast shortly before 12:30 a.m. Friday. Federal agents have been at the scene since then as a crew of nearly 200 firefighters battled the blaze around the clock before nearly snuffing the flames on Sunday.

Officials said only one tank containing 210,000 barrels of jet fuel remained burning and that was finally extinguished sometime Sunday afternoon. The facility supplies the Puerto Rico Electric Power Authority, some 200 Gulf gas stations on the island and stores jet fuel.

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Brother Defends Alleged Terror Suspect On Facebook

The family of alleged terror suspect Tarek Mehanna is proclaiming his innocence and turning to Facebook to get the family’s message out.

From WCVB TV 5 Boston

Tamer Mehanna said his brother, Tarek, was set-up by federal agents with false and ludicrous accusations because of his constant refusal to tell lies about the Muslim community as an FBI informant.

“Free Tarek Mehanna” is the official and public Facebook site for people who believe in his innocence.

His brother says Mehanna refused a year’s worth of FBI attempts to make the Massachusetts College of Pharmacy graduate a confidential informant.

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The Case Against Alleged Terror Suspect Tarek Mehanna

Alleged terror suspect Tarek Mehanna, arrested earlier this week, plotted to attack Americans at a shopping mall according to the FBI. Failing at that,it is alleged he turned to cyber attacks.

Frustrated at failing in his travels overseas to locate a terrorist training camp, a Massachusetts man returned home in 2003 to begin plotting a domestic terror attack. Thrilled by the 9/11 attacks and impressed by the success of the Washington, D.C., snipers in terrorizing the public in late 2002, Tarek Mehanna and several friends began planning an attack on a shopping mall, a Federal Bureau of Investigation complaint alleges.

In “multiple conversations, discussions, and preparation,” Tarek Mehanna, a student living at home with his parents in Sudbury, Mass., discussed with three other men how to “obtain automatic weapons, go to a shopping mall, and randomly shoot people,” according to the federal criminal complaint filed in a US district court Wednesday.

The trio – Mehanna, Ahmad Abousamra, and an unnamed informant – debated logistics, types of weapons needed, the number of attackers needed, how to coordinate the attack, and how to attack emergency responders, the FBI says.

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FBI Raids Slaughterhouse In Ongoing Investigation

Several news reports are circulating in regards to an FBI raid on a Illinois slaughterhouse. Although details are sketchy, there is no indication the raids are in any way connected to terrorism.

We’ve included links to a few of the reports.

Authorities Confirm Raid, No One Taken Into Custody

Federal agents conducted a raid Sunday afternoon at a goat meat processing plant near Morris, Illinois. The secretive operation was led by the Chicago FBI office. CBS 2’s Mike Puccinelli reports that on Monday, the Feds are being very tight-lipped on what they found and why they were even there.

Spokesman Ross Rice confirms agents were at 6260 Kinsman Road, in Kinsman, Illinois. The business is called First World Management. Rice would not say why agents were there but said nobody was taken into custody.

The FBI said the raid began Sunday morning and ended in the late afternoon. They were at the plant about nine hours total.

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From WBBM 780

Federal agents conducted a raid Sunday afternoon at a goat meat processing plant near Morris, Illinois.

The operation was led by the Chicago FBI office.  An agent confirmed for Newsradio 780 they were executing a search warrant at the First World Management plant in Kinsman, Illinois.

Why is a mystery.  A call to the plant was met largely with silence.  We did get confirmation that some items — possibly computers — were seized and that there were no arrests.

Neighbors who saw the raid tell CBS 2 News it was a huge operation, involving more than 100 agents, police officers and even what one believed to be National Guard troops.

One witness said she saw troops carrying M-16 rifles that were trained on a group of men sitting on the ground outside the facility.

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From the Chicago Tribune

Federal agents investigating possible Immigration irregularities conducted raids at a Grundy County meatpacking business and several Chicago locations over the weekend, sources familiar with the probe said Monday.

The FBI’s Chicago office confirmed agents took part in the execution of a search warrant Sunday at a First World Management Services plant in Kinsman, northwest of Dwight. FBI spokesman Ross Rice said no arrests were made there.

But a source said the owner of the plant, which processes lamb and goat, was taken into custody at his home in Chicago.

Documents and records were taken from the plant and from a Chicago travel agency on West Devon Avenue, also owned by the same person, the source said.

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Federal Agents Seize Property of Nuclear Critic

The New York times is reporting that Federal agents have seized six computers, two cameras, two cellphones and hundreds of files from a Los Alamos, N.M., physicist.

In the report, an FBI spokesman in Albuquerque, states that the action on Monday was part of “an ongoing federal investigation” and that he could provide no details.

The physicist, P. Leonardo Mascheroni, said he was told that the seizures were part of a criminal investigation into possible nuclear espionage. Dr. Mascheroni also declared his innocence.

“If I were a real spy,” he said Tuesday in a telephone interview, “I would have left the country a long time ago.”

Dr. Mascheroni was laid off from the Los Alamos National Laboratory in 1988 and has ever since championed an innovative type of laser fusion, which seeks to harness the energy that powers the sun, the stars and hydrogen bombs.

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Stolen Canadian Plane Lands In Missouri

Police captured the pilot of a stolen Canadian plane late Monday night, ending a bizarre pursuit that began in Thunder Bay, Ont., and ended in a small Missouri town.

The pilot took a single-engine Cessna 172 from a Thunder Bay aviation school and soon crossed into U.S. airspace. Authorities scrambled two F-16 fighter jets to track the aircraft as it made its way over Wisconsin and Illinois.

Nearly eight hours later, at about 10 p.m. ET, the pilot landed on a dirt road in the southern Missouri town of Ellsinore and fled on foot.

Officials with the Federal Bureau of Investigation then arrested 31-year-old suspect Yavuz Burke, a native of Turkey who became a Canadian citizen last year. He was formerly known as Adam Leon.

Earlier, the North American Aerospace Defense Command had scrambled two F-16 fighter jets to track the plane.

Lt.-Cmdr. Gary Ross, a spokesperson for NORAD, said the pilot did not respond to radio calls from the jets or the FAA.

He also said the pilot refused to acknowledge the nonverbal communications from the F-16 jets to follow them. It appears the plane only landed as it came close to running out of fuel.

The plane was reported stolen at about 2:30 p.m. ET and was spotted flying erratically.

At about 5 p.m., the state capital building in Madison, Wis., was evacuated before the plane passed near the region. Police cars cordoned off the streets around the building and officers told people to move away from the area.

The small plane belongs to Confederation College’s aviation program and was taken off from the Thunder Bay International Airport.

According to local radio, someone jumped the fence and took off on an unauthorized flight.

City police are at the scene at the college’s hangar. Police spokesperson Chris Adams says officers have little to go on at the time.

According to Cessna’s website, the Cessna 172 Skyhawk is world’s most flown airplane. It has a maximum cruise speed of 233 kilometres an hour and a range of 1,130 km.
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