Militants wire Web with links to jihad

[InfoSec News <isn () c4i org>]

Forwarded from: William Knowles <wk () c4i org>

http://www.usatoday.com/news/world/2002/07/10/web-terror-cover.htm

[As I was reading this, I could hear the muffled chants of the Vikings 
in the corner of my home office singing "FUD, fud, fud, fud, lovely 
fud, lovely fud, fud, fud, fud..."   -  WK]


By Jack Kelley, 
USA TODAY 
07/10/2002 

ISLAMABAD, Pakistan -- One Web site urges Muslims to travel to
Pakistan to "slaughter American soldiers." Another solicits donations
to buy dynamite to "blow up Israeli Jews." A third shows new videotape
of Osama bin Laden and promises film clips of American casualties in
Afghanistan. As the United States and its allies hunt them in caves,
mountains and jungles, al-Qaeda, Hamas and dozens of other militant
Muslim groups are increasingly turning to the Internet to carry on
their jihad, or holy war, against the West, U.S. law enforcement
officials and experts say. It has become one of al-Qaeda's primary
means of communication, they say. The groups use Web sites to plan
attacks, recruit members and solicit donations with little or no
chance of being caught by the FBI or other law enforcement agencies,
officials say.

This new cyber-battlefield is allowing al-Qaeda and other groups to
stay "several steps ahead" of the U.S.-led war on terrorism, a senior
U.S. law enforcement official says.

Most of the information on the Web sites is written in Arabic and
encrypted, or scrambled. The encrypted data is then hidden in digital
photographs, which makes it difficult, if not impossible, to find or
read, officials say. The groups regularly change the addresses of
their Web sites to confound officials.

"Under the present circumstances of the global war against terrorism,
the Internet has become a vital tool and, obviously, an easy one to
exploit," says terrorism analyst Reuven Paz of the International
Policy Institute for Counter-Terrorism, an independent think tank
based in Herzliya, Israel. It's "the most efficient way (for
terrorists) to spread their message on a daily basis."

U.S. officials have little doubt that al-Qaeda and other militant
groups are using the Web to set up terrorist attacks against the
United States. They tell USA TODAY that Abu Zubaydah, 30, a
Palestinian who was arrested in Pakistan last March and is suspected
of being bin Laden's operations chief, used a Web site to plan the
Sept. 11 attacks and to communicate with the terrorists who hijacked
jets and flew them into the World Trade Center and Pentagon.

Earlier this year, officials say, they found nearly 2,300 encrypted
messages and data files in a password-protected section of an Islamic
Web site that had been downloaded onto Zubaydah's computer. The
messages began in May 2000, peaked in August 2001 and stopped Sept. 9,
two days before the attacks, officials say. They declined to identify
the Web site.

Volume of messages doubles

Lately, al-Qaeda operatives have been sending hundreds of encrypted
messages that have been hidden in files on digital photographs on the
auction site eBay.com. Most of the messages have been sent from
Internet cafes in Pakistan and public libraries throughout the world.  
An eBay spokesperson did not return phone calls.

The volume of the messages has nearly doubled in the past month,
indicating to some U.S. intelligence officials that al-Qaeda is
planning another attack.

Tuesday, al-Qaeda spokesman Suliman Abu Ghaith told an Arabic
newspaper that the group's suicide militants were "ready and
impatient" to attack U.S. targets in America and around the world.

Since Sept. 11, the FBI, CIA and National Security Agency say they
have hired dozens more Arabic-speaking analysts and mathematicians to
interpret and decode the information on the Web sites.

They add that there's little they can do to stop the terrorist groups
from using the Web to communicate. There are no laws directly
regulating the sites or preventing them from operating. Instead,
officials must persuade the companies that host the sites to shut them
down. But as soon as a terrorist site is taken off one Web server, it
often appears on another, officials say.

In the past five weeks, al-Qaeda's Arabic Web site, alneda.com, has
emerged on three different servers, in Malaysia, Texas and Michigan.  
The site was eventually removed from the servers after the Web hosting
companies, which say they often don't screen or translate the sites,
received complaints from the public and law enforcement agencies. U.S. 
officials are expecting the site, which began operating in January,
to re-emerge soon.

"The U.S. enemy, unable to gain the upper hand over the mujahedin on
the battlefield, has since Sept. 11 been trying to gag the world
media," said a statement posted on alneda.com last week. "The more the
United States tries to stifle freedom of expression, the more
determined we will become to break the silence. America will lose the
media war, too."

Hatred, hidden messages

There are dozens of suspected terrorist Web sites, many of which were
started after the U.S.-led war on terrorism began last fall. Most of
the Web sites are written in Arabic. All carry statements that express
hatred for the United States and its allies and fatwas, or religious
rulings, that call on militant Muslims to kill Americans and attack
U.S. interests. USA TODAY examined many of the sites and had the
information there translated from Arabic into English. Among the most
prominent sites:

* Azzam.com, a site that U.S. officials believe is linked with
  al-Qaeda, is urging Muslims to travel to Pakistan and Afghanistan
  to fight "the Jewish-backed American Crusaders," or U.S. soldiers.
  It gives such travelers tips on how to avoid raising suspicions of
  employers, diplomats and police.

  "If you are working, either resign from your job and take a year off
  or request unpaid leave from your employer. Many large companies
  offer unpaid leave to their employees for periods ranging from two
  months to one year. That way you can fulfill your obligation (of
  jihad) and not have to give up your job," the site says.

  U.S. officials say azzam.com contains encrypted messages in its
  pictures and texts — a practice known as steganography. They say the
  hidden messages contain instructions for al-Qaeda's next terrorist
  attacks. Mathematicians and other experts at the National Security
  Agency at Fort Meade, Md., are using supercomputers to try to break
  the encryption codes and thwart the attacks.

  At least one known al-Qaeda operative has accessed the site,
  European officials say. German intelligence agencies, which broke
  into the site last fall, found an e-mail address for Said Bahaji, a
  suspected member of the al-Qaeda cell in Hamburg, Germany, that
  planned parts of the Sept. 11 attacks. Bahaji, who was last seen in
  Germany, has since disappeared.

* Almuhajiroun.com, an English-language Web site also linked to
  al-Qaeda, urges sympathizers to assassinate Pakistani President
  Pervez Musharraf. The Web site, which pictures Musharraf, refers to
  him as "the American puppet." It calls U.S. troops in Pakistan and
  Afghanistan "soldiers of Satan."

  "The punishment of those who wage war against Allah and His apostle
  and strive to make mischief in the land is only this: that they
  should be murdered or crucified or their hands and their feet should
  be cut off on opposite sides or they should be imprisoned," the site
  says in apparent reference to Musharraf.

* Qassam.net, a site U.S. officials believe is linked to the militant
  Muslim group Hamas, is appealing for donations to purchase AK-47
  rifles, dynamite and bullets "to assist the cause of jihad and
  resistance until the (Israeli) occupation is eliminated and Muslim
  Palestine is liberated." It recommends donations of $3 per bullet,
  $100 per kilogram (2.2 pounds) of dynamite, $2,000 for a Kalashnikov
  assault rifle and $12,000 for a rocket-propelled grenade.
  
  Donors are asked to send an e-mail to an address on the Web site.
  Recently, they received a response telling them to transfer money to
  "Ahmed Mohammed Ali, Elbatech Bank, account no.: 38926/9/510 Arab
  bank - Gaza branch - Palestine." The account name and number appear
  to change every 48 to 72 hours. "Dear Donor: Please tell us the
  field in which you prefer your money to be spent on such as:
  martyrdom attacks; buying weapons for the mujahadeen; training the
  youth; or inventing and developing missiles, mortars (and)
  explosives," the e-mail said.

  U.S. officials say they are monitoring the site, which is hosted by
  an American company, to see who is using it to donate to Hamas. They
  say they intend to prosecute those Americans who contribute.

  Until the site was taken down, alneda.com carried a warning from Abu
  Ghaith saying the United States should "fasten its seat belt" and
  prepare for more terrorist attacks. The site, which featured the
  words "No pride without jihad," also contained encrypted information
  that directed al-Qaeda members to a more secure site where
  instructions for attacks were given, U.S. officials say.

Other Internet sites, including jihadunspun.net, offer a 36-minute
video of bin Laden, with four minutes of previously unaired footage;  
pictures of President Bush with his head in the sights of a gun; and
other propaganda.

Not all the Islamic Web sites are calling for a jihad against the
United States. The alsaha.com site has hosted chat rooms where members
criticize bin Laden and al-Qaeda for their misuse of Islam. "(Bin
Laden) is a disgrace to our religion and has made a mockery of
everything we believe," said one comment posted on alsaha.com. "He is
not an Islamist; he is a terrorist who deserves to be killed. God
bless and protect America!"

Easy to set up

It's easy for terrorists to set up a Web site, officials and experts
say.

In the case of alneda.com, al-Qaeda members used a made-up name, "The
Center for Islamic Studies and Research," a bogus street address in
Venezuela and a free Hotmail e-mail account to contact a Web hosting
company in Malaysia called Emerge Systems, U.S. intelligence officials
say. The group then wired $87 to a Malaysian bank to pay for the cost
of the Web site for a year.

"Internet communications have become the main communications system
among al-Qaeda around the world because it's safer, easier and more
anonymous if they take the right precautions, and I think they're
doing that," former CIA counterterrorism chief Vince Cannistraro says.

But al-Qaeda operatives now are urging their members to use caution.  
Just before alneda.com was pulled off its server, it warned its
members that the site was probably being monitored by the FBI, CIA and
Customs Service. It promised to e-mail members the new address of the
Web site once it was in operation. It also told them they could find
the address in chat rooms on other terror sites, such as Hamas'
qassam.net.

"We strongly urge Muslim Internet professionals to spread and
disseminate news and information about the jihad through e-mail lists,
discussion groups and their own Web sites," says a statement on
azzam.com. "The more Web sites, the better it is for us. We must make
the Internet our tool."



 
*==============================================================*
"Communications without intelligence is noise;  Intelligence
without communications is irrelevant." Gen Alfred. M. Gray, USMC
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