[Mb-civic] Terrorists Turn to the Web as Base of Operations - Washington Post

[William Swiggard]

Terrorists Turn to the Web as Base of Operations

By Steve Coll and Susan B. Glasser
Washington Post Staff Writers
Sunday, August 7, 2005; Page A01

In the snow-draped mountains near Jalalabad in November 2001, as the 
Taliban collapsed and al Qaeda lost its Afghan sanctuary, Osama bin 
Laden biographer Hamid Mir watched "every second al Qaeda member 
carrying a laptop computer along with a Kalashnikov" as they prepared to 
scatter into hiding and exile. On the screens were photographs of Sept. 
11 hijacker Mohamed Atta.

Nearly four years later, al Qaeda has become the first guerrilla 
movement in history to migrate from physical space to cyberspace. With 
laptops and DVDs, in secret hideouts and at neighborhood Internet cafes, 
young code-writing jihadists have sought to replicate the training, 
communication, planning and preaching facilities they lost in 
Afghanistan with countless new locations on the Internet.

<>Al Qaeda suicide bombers and ambush units in Iraq routinely depend on 
the Web for training and tactical support, relying on the Internet's 
anonymity and flexibility to operate with near impunity in cyberspace. 
In Qatar, Egypt and Europe, cells affiliated with al Qaeda that have 
recently carried out or seriously planned bombings have relied heavily 
on the Internet.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/08/05/AR2005080501138.html 

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