Data Breach Identifies 22,000 ISIS Members
Posted by: Timothy Weaver on 03/11/2016 12:09 PM
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In the vein of Edward Snowden, an insider released data that can identify 22,000 ISIS members.
That personal data includes the fighters’ names, phone numbers, hometown and even blood types—all information they apparently filled out on forms in the process of signing up to join the violent group.
Sky News reports that the leak does in fact contain the information of known ISIS recruits, such as the British former rapper Abdel Bary and the hacker Junaid Hussain, who was killed in a drone strike last summer.
Matthew Levitt, a counterterrorism analyst with the Washington Institute for Near East Policy, says that if the leaked ISIS information is as real and comprehensive as it appears to be, it could be a unexpected gift for security agencies and prosecutors trying to track ISIS’ members and prevent more recruits from joining.
“From a macro intelligence perspective, this type of information is a treasure trove for intelligence analysts,” says Levitt.
“There may be someone’s phone number that’s come up some place else that could be put together with this to create a holistic picture of things that we didn’t know were important at the time,” says Levitt.
“ISIS operates largely in denied physical space, and penetrating its virtual space has been very difficult, too,” he says. “When someone provides you this kind of information, it’s very exciting.”
Source: Wired
That personal data includes the fighters’ names, phone numbers, hometown and even blood types—all information they apparently filled out on forms in the process of signing up to join the violent group. Sky News reports that the leak does in fact contain the information of known ISIS recruits, such as the British former rapper Abdel Bary and the hacker Junaid Hussain, who was killed in a drone strike last summer.
Matthew Levitt, a counterterrorism analyst with the Washington Institute for Near East Policy, says that if the leaked ISIS information is as real and comprehensive as it appears to be, it could be a unexpected gift for security agencies and prosecutors trying to track ISIS’ members and prevent more recruits from joining.
“From a macro intelligence perspective, this type of information is a treasure trove for intelligence analysts,” says Levitt.
“There may be someone’s phone number that’s come up some place else that could be put together with this to create a holistic picture of things that we didn’t know were important at the time,” says Levitt.
“ISIS operates largely in denied physical space, and penetrating its virtual space has been very difficult, too,” he says. “When someone provides you this kind of information, it’s very exciting.”
Source: Wired
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