Tony Mingacci's List: DGL 3.6 Digital Citizenship Assignment

• London (CNN) -- The days of would-be terrorists needing to travel to far-off camps to make contacts and learn how to build bombs is rapidly receding. Social media forums like Twitter and Facebook provide a ready made Rolodex of sources -- dig further online, mine those contacts further, gain admission to private chat forums and eventually you will find instructions for bomb making.
• • Militant groups are networking on Twitter
• Last month al Qaeda in the Islamic Magreb (AQIM) launched a Twitter account that has already gained more than 5,500 follower
• AQIM's account is following seven people including the Somali terrorist group Al Shabaab's official twitter handle and the al Nusra front in Syria, which in turn is following another rebel group in Aleppo.
• The British security service MI5 and its sister spy organizations GCHQ and MI6 all monitor social media, noting who is following whom on sites like Twitter, and providing vital information about alliances being forged between different groups and individuals
• • British intel monitors the militant's networking
• Jean Paul Rouiller from the Geneva Centre for the Training and Analysis of Terrorism says social media is vital to modern terrorist organizations.

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• Opinion: How terror can breed through social media
• One of the largest manhunts in the nation's history was hurtling toward a conclusion after paralyzing a city and captivating the nation. Two brothers, Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, 19, and Tamerlan Tsarnaev, 26, would become known as the suspects in the Boston Marathon bombings that killed three people and wounded 264 others.

• Across the Charles River, several blocks from the shooting scene, a man who authorities believe was Tamerlan Tsarnaev approached a black Mercedes ML 350 SUV in the Allston neighborhood and tapped on the passenger window. The driver rolled down the window and the suspect reached inside, opened the door and brandished his handgun.

   

  "Did you hear about the Boston explosion?" he said, according to an affidavit. "I did that."

   

  He pulled the magazine from his weapon and showed he was loaded. "I am serious," he said.
• It was there, the driver said, the two men transferred heavy objects into the Mercedes
• • Bombers carjacked a car and robbed the victim. 
• They wanted more money so he gave them his ATM card and the passcode
• Tamerlan put his gun in the door pocket to fiddle with a navigation system.
• The carjacking victim had left his cell phone in the SUV, and police were using it to monitor the vehicle's every movement. It was now shortly after 12:30 a.m. Friday
• Andrew Kitzenberg lives in a three-story home at 62 Laurel, the location where the gun battle began. He saw two men crouched behind the SUV, opening fire on police.
• They have explosives
• • Witness Tweets to warn about gunfight
• Kitzenberg ran upstairs to his third-floor bedroom and peeked out a window, capturing the chaotic scene on his phone. At 12:55 a.m., he tweeted, "Shoot out outside my room in Watertown. 62 Laurel st."
• The suspects grabbed a backpack, apparently from the Honda, pulled out a pressure-cooker bomb
• and placed it on the groun
• "Shoot out with 5 minutes of gun fire and pressure cooker bomb," Kitzenberg tweeted at 12:57 a.m
• He followed quickly with another tweet at 1 a.m.: "PD claiming IED's on the street. Everyone stay off of laurel st."
• • The Bombers had to have learned how to make the explosives and who to target inline
• "I actually saw them light the bomb and I saw a spark from it. As soon as I saw that spark I hit the ground," he recalled
• "When they started using explosives, then I knew it was something much more significant and pretty much knew who I was looking at," he told CNN.
• The brothers tossed out five pipe bombs; two or three explode

•  

  The younger brother slammed into Tamerlan, dragging him about 20 yards. "Ran over his brother," said Deveau.
• The black SUV with Dzhokhar behind the wheel managed to escape, with cops giving chase
• That morning, authorities took the unprecedented measure of telling residents of greater Boston to stay indoors. Schools were closed. Restaurants shut for the day. One of the nation's largest cities became a ghost town, its streets clear of people and traffic.
• A state police helicopter used a thermal imaging camera to determine that Dzhokhar was alive and moving. A robotic arm was used to remove part of the tarp and further reveal the suspect.
• "At that point," Deveau said, "we felt comfortable enough to send some officer tactical equipment to grab him and pull him away from the boa
• explosive ves
• At 8:45 p.m., Boston police tweeted: "CAPTURED!!! The hunt is over. The search is done. The terror is over. And justice has won. Suspect in custody."
• • Boston Police Tweeted: "Captured!!!
• a reporter asked if the suspect had been captured.
• A smile spread across his face. "Yes," he said.

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• Militant cleric Anwar al-Awlaki continues to speak through sermons posted online, and U.S. officials are investigating whether his words may have influenced Boston bombers Tamerlan and Dzhokhar Tsarnaev.

• The Boston Police Department announced on Twitter: “Suspect in custody. Officers sweeping the area,” and MayorThomas M. Menino posted: “We got him.”
• • Tweeting cops
• The discovery of Mr. Tsarnaev came just over 26 hours after the F.B.I. circulated pictures of him and his brother and called them suspects in Monday’s bombings
• the two shot and killed a campus police officer
• carjacked a sport utility vehicle

• led police on a chase, tossing several pipe bombs from their vehicle.
• one of the suspects
• Tamerlan Tsarnaev, 26, a former boxer, had been shot and fatally wounded. He was wearing explosives
• But Dzhokhar Tsarnaev (joe-HARR tsar-NAH-yev) managed to escape — running over his older brother as he sped away, the officials said.
• His disappearance
• set off an intense manhunt
• SWAT teams and Humvees rolled through residential streets. Military helicopters hovered overhead. Bomb squads were called to several locations. And Boston, New England’s largest city, was essentially shut down.
• The F.B.I. conducted a review, examining Web sites that he had visited, trying to determine whether he was spending time with extremists and ultimately interviewing him
• Kevin R. Brock, a former senior F.B.I. and counterterrorism official, said, “It’s a key thread for investigators and the intelligence community to pull on.”

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• • CIA had knowledge Tamerlan was a threat
• The CIA, however, had named Tamerlan to a terrorist database 18 months ago
• The new disclosure that Tamerlan Tsarnaev was included within a huge, classified database of known and suspected terrorists before the attacks was expected to drive congressional inquiries in coming weeks about whether the Obama administration adequately investigated tips from Russia that Tsarnaev had posed a security threat.
• Inside the FBI's secret terrorist screening center
• In the first time cameras are allowed inside the facility, Bob Orr takes a tour of the FBI's secret installation that keeps tabs on terrorists
• U.S. officials said the intelligence community had no information about threats to the marathon before the April 15
• • similarities in story

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• The Boston Mar

  athon Over-Reaction
• The intense response to the Boston Marathon bombings – including a government shutdown of metropolitan Boston and hysterical national news coverage – sent troubling messages, both on civil liberties and the U.S. susceptibility to terrorist-inspired disruptions, says Independent Institute’s Ivan Eland
• the saturation media coverage and resulting societal frenzy is unwarranted and actually harmful
• he and his brother had acted alone and that no other plots were afoot.
• first clue was the crude nature of the bomb
• The bombers may have learned how to build them from looking at jihadist websites on the Internet.
• the amateur terrorists carjacked a vehicle, apparently told the owner of their future plans of causing mayhem in New York City an
• after the owner escaped – were tracked by police from the GPS in a cell phone.
• law enforcement authorities don’t like to admit it — because it undermines their effort to hype the terrorist threat to get more money and personnel
• • Terrorist hype can generate more funding for law enforcement 
• The accidental explosion at a fertilizer plant in Texas occurring at roughly the same time killed more people and yet was a back-page stor
• sensational media coverage of the incident in Boston was unwarranted
• y. To pay attention, the American media and public apparently need a diabolical villain on U.S. soil.
• Also on the back pages at the same time were 185 Nigerians killed in an incident involving the organized Islamist terrorist group, Boko Haram
• and the uncovering of an organized al-Qaeda plot to derail a train in Canada
• The overwrought, around-the-clock media coverage (or the potential for it) of events such as the Boston Marathon bombing leads local, state and federal officials to overreact in their response. The authorities completely shut down the city of Boston and some suburbs, requiring people to stay inside. However, during similar “lone wolf” sniper attacks in the suburbs of Washington, D.C. in 2002, authorities made no effort to close down those suburbs or the city
• • The saturation in media made officials overreact in response
• In such crises, the media and public often take their cues from government officials. Hyping the threat from feckless terrorists and draconian responses, such as a lockdown of a major metropolitan area, by officials lead to hysterical responses on the part of the media and public.
• • Over saturation in media and official overreaction causes public panic

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• Jeff Bauman, in wheelchair, moments after he was injured in an explosion near the finish line of the Boston Marathon on Monday. From his hospital bed, Bauman helped identify one of the suspects
• He looked into a killer's eyes, hidden behind sunglasses, minutes before the bombs went off and destroyed his legs.
• Jeff Bauman
• he asked for a paper and pen
• and according to Bloomberg News wrote:
• • Quote
• "Bag, saw the guy, looked right at me.

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• asked for pen and paper and wrote a note to the FBI
• Jeff Bauman, a victim who lost both legs
• "bag, saw the guy, looked right at me"
• The suspects, initially identified by the FBI as unnamed suspects 1 and 2 (or "black hat" and "white hat", respectively) from photographic and video evidence, had "acted differently" after the explosions; they had stayed to watch the aftermath and walked away "casually", rather than fleeing.^[
• • Suspects caught on tape
• Asked for assistance in identifying the suspects, the public provided a deluge of photographs and home movie records to police, which were scrutinized by both authorities and online public social networks.^[65]
• A few hours after the photos were released, the suspects allegedly shot Sean A. Collier of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology Police Department multiple times, killing him

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• FBI: Help us ID Boston bomb suspects
• (CNN) -- After three days of poring over photos and video, investigators appealed to the public to help them identify two men now considered suspects in the Boston Marathon bombings.
• People with possible information on the two men were urged to go to the FBI's website, https://bostonmarathontips.fbi.gov, or call 800-CALL-FBI (800-225-5324)
• Thursday evening, authorities already had received a "large volume of call
• "No one should approach them," he said. "No one should attempt to apprehend them except law enforcement.
• They acted differently than everyone else'
• Other footage, still unreleased, shows that the two suspects stayed at the scene to watch the carnage unfold,
• "When the bombs blow up
• the two suspects walk away pretty casually

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• Boston Bomb Victim in Photo Helped Identify Suspects
• A man wearing a cap, sunglasses and a black jacket over a hooded sweatshirt looked at Jeff, 27, and dropped a bag at his feet,
• Two and a half minutes later, the bag exploded, tearing Jeff’s legs apart
• He woke up under so much drugs, asked for a paper and pen and wrote, ‘bag, saw the guy, looked right at me,’” Chris Bauman said yesterday in an interview.

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• After getting away, the carjacked man alerted polic
• police then zeroed on his cell phone -- left behind in the car -- to track the suspects

• Brian Stelter: Media May Have 'Overreacted' To Boston Marathon Bombing (VIDEO)
• The Huffington Post   |       By Catherine Taibi                          Posted: 12/29/2013 12:47 pm EST
• "I wonder if the press overall in retrospect overreacted to the attacks in Boston," he said. "It was a very scary week. I was scared along with the rest of the country.
• In retrospect, I wonder if there was an overreaction in the press because

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