Computer Crime Research Center

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Terrorism and high technologies

Date: April 14, 2004
Source: Computer Crime Research Center
By: Dmitri Kramarenko

Last week French police managed to arrest a certain Mustafa Baachi, high tech expert of Al-Qaeda who allegedly committed numerous e-frauds and organized of assaults on French financial institutions. His brother Hassan helped him, having been working as a guard in a bank.

Representatives of Spanish and French special services think that data received from these arrested Al-Qaeda members will allow to disclose schemes of Al-Qaeda units' collaboration in the whole Europe and to cut off many sources of their financing.

According to Dale Watson, FBI's former counterterrorism chief, thefts of data on debit/credit cards allow criminals and terrorists to steal money. A number of Islamic organizations (like Al-Qaeda) use this method to replenish their cash. Terrorist organizations Al-Qaeda, Hezbollah, HAMAS, Abu Nidal actively use the Internet and newest achievements of high technologies for teaching their thoughts, recruiting new members, planning and committing terrorist attacks.

During investigation, officers found out that units of Al-Qaeda responsible for recent terrorist acts in Spain were financed at the expense of bank robberies and forged cards operations in France, informs a website of Telegraph referring to the results of the investigation. Investigators say Moroccan extremists, that form the majority of Spanish cells of Al-Qaeda, received hundreds of thousands of dollars from their French "colleagues" at the stage of preparation of large-scale terrorist acts.

Terrorists, connected to Al-Qaeda, carry out tests on using the Internet and social software-hardware means to realize their cyber threats addressing the USA and Israel.

Cyber threats or cyber intrusions are unauthorized attempts to break into computers, computer systems or networks. These illegal actions may be performed with any purposes from simple intrusion into a system and its examination for fun, thrill or interest to break in with the purpose of revenge, data theft, hinder, confusion, extortion or money theft. Also they are performed with the purpose of intentional localized damage of computers or causing damage to significantly bigger infrastructures, for example water or power supply systems.
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2008-03-18 09:24:42 - just imagine that somebody had implanted a... soledademelo
2007-08-23 15:31:42 - [email protected] paul persaud
2005-09-02 01:11:58 - Very nice Misho
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