Daesh plans cyber war in US, Europe

Daesh terrorists are stoking alarm with threats of an all-out cyber crusade against the United States, and experts said the warnings should be taken seriously, The Hill newspaper reported Sunday.

Hackers claiming affiliation with the so-called Islamic State in Iraq and Syria (ISIS) released a video Monday vowing an “electronic war” against the United States and Europe and claiming access to “American leadership” online.

“Praise to Allah, today we extend on the land and in the Internet,” a faceless, hooded figure said in Arabic. “We send this message to America and Europe: we are the hackers of the Islamic State and the electronic war has not yet begun.”
The video received ridicule online for its poor phrasing and the group’s apparent inability to make good on its cyber threat this week.

But as hackers around the world become more sophisticated, terrorist groups are likely to follow their lead and use the same tools to further their ends, experts said.

“It’s only really a matter of time till we start seeing terrorist organizations using cyber attack techniques in a more expanded way,” said John Cohen, a former counter terrorism coordinator at the Department of Homeland Security.

“The concern is that as an organization like ISIS acquires more resources financially they will be able to hire the talent they need or outsource to criminal organizations,” Cohen added. “I think they’re probably moving in that direction anyway.”

“At what point do they decide they need to move from viewing the Internet as a source of recruitment … [to] viewing it as a potential weapon system?” Rogers asked.

While Daesh has been widely recognized for its social media prowess, the growing computer science talent of its recruits has mostly gone unnoticed.

“A number of individuals that have recently joined the movement of ISIS were folks that studied computer science in British schools and European universities,” said Tom Kellermann, chief cyber security officer at security firm Trend Micro, who said ISIS’s cyber capabilities are “advancing dramatically.”

Even the man responsible for a number of the brutal ISIS beheadings, dubbed “Jihadi John” by his captives, has a computer science degree, Kellermann said.