OK, so sensationalistic headlines targeted at Second Life are so last week; from FBI related gambling bans to animal sex, we’ve seen a lot. Now there are allegations being printed by News Corp in Australia that suggest that the next major terrorist attack on a Western country could be being planned in Second Life, and yes, as can be seen in the picture to the right, 9/11 is being used as a reference point as well.
The report describes in detail various griefer operations as being terrorist attacks and goes on to say that:
On the darker side, there are also weapons armouries in SL where people can get access to guns, including automatic weapons and AK47s. Searches of the SL website show there are three jihadi terrorists registered and two elite jihadist terrorist groups.
The fear factor is so thick, it can’t be easily paraphrased
With the game taking such a sinister turn, terrorism experts are warning that SL attacks have ramifications for the real world. Just as September 11 terrorists practised flying planes on simulators in preparation for their deadly assault on US buildings, law enforcement agencies believe some of those behind the Second Life attacks are home-grown Australian jihadists who are rehearsing for strikes against real targets. Terrorist organisations al-Qaeda and Jemaah Islamiah traditionally sent potential jihadists to train in military camps in Pakistan, Afghanistan and Southeast Asia. But due to increased surveillance and intelligence-gathering, they are swapping some military training to online camps to evade detection and avoid prosecution.
The terrorists must get broadband in their caves now.
Rohan Gunaratna, author of Inside al-Qaeda, says it is a new phenomena that, until now, has not been openly discussed outside the intelligence community….”They are rehearsing their operations in Second Life because they don’t have the opportunity to rehearse in the real world”
Be alert, but not alarmed
“Community representatives are relied on to report suspicious or inappropriate behaviour to the owners or the SL authorities, just as in the real world.”
Next up: Terrorist found using Counter-strike to train! News at 11.
Oh wait… we already went through that phase of crappy news.
Funny.
Chuck Norris needs to create a SL character and pwn those noobs.
Vigilance is great, but man, so many times it’s just embarrassing to read this kind of thing. Flight simulators– maybe that can translate into the real world. Second Life ‘attacks’? I just don’t think so.
You control an airplane with controllers much like on a computer. You control your body with– your body, not a keyboard or mouse. I can practice layups in Larry Bird and Dr. J One on One all day, and it won’t improve my street skillz at all. Trust me.
I saw this this morning and hung my head.
News Corp has no clue, and to make social computing in all its forms exciting for the mainstream they feel the need to sensationalise it. Thus the story you refer to.
Fringe nutjobs are fringe nutjobs wherever they are, whether that’s SL, bombing FBI buildings or forming governments. Yes, they’re dangerous and need stopping or watching, but it’s not like SL or anywhere else online is a breeding ground awash with crazies.
News about stuff like the use of SL as a recruitment, marketing and meeting hub isn’t worth publishing – only the social computing set (of which I am a proud, card-carrying member) get excited by that stuff – we live in a bubble most of society doesn’t understand.
OK, I can write off to a slow news day the bogus story about a few porn DVDs showing up at Amp’d. But terrorists planning attacks on 2nd Life? If so, then the attack on John Edwards’ SL stage is evidence we’re about to be invaded by giant octopi made entirely of crap, along with their sidekicks, rainbow-colored worms wearing hats.
Wouldn’t it be a lot easier, more stealthy and more realistic to model your targets (and simulate defending forces) using Halo 2?
“Chuck Norris needs to create a SL character and pwn those noobs.”
LoL!!!!
Paul
I think their might have been a passing reference to WOW in the article on news.com.au as well.
hmmmmm
You should all be afraid….very afraid
People like to play terrorist online.
Terrorists have long used the Internet.
Whether this particular coverage is confusing the two or not, a lot of these tools are being and/or will be used by terrorists cause they’re good tools.
They also use bombs, guns, cooking utensils, video cameras and ball point pens.
If I was a New Yorker, I’d probably be asking the cops to search my bags for matches and kleenex before entering the subway cause I hear terrorists use them.
If was in Boston, I’d probably be asking the police to round up all Lite Brite units.
Did you know cell phones are used to trigger some IEDs?
Since I don’t like cell phones all that much, I’m going to focus on pressuring legislators to ban all cell phones as terrorist devices.
On the real, if the Second Life stuff was actually organized by potential terrorists, it’s more likely a recruitment and/or propaganda tool rather than a training tool. Like the Army does with their online games.
Hahah oh fox news!
They hate us for our virtual freedom
We fight them in Second Life so we dont have to fight them in first life
“The terrorists must get broadband in their caves now.”
Pretty funny…but the truth of the matter is that terrorists selected for international operations (not “put this vest on and go to the store” types) are typically fairly well educated and well funded.
As we saw recently, they are doctors. On 9/11 they were college grads with laptops, broadband, flight simulator technology and real-life flight training.
Just because we would like to believe things are limited to a few cave-men doesn’t make it so.
Well, the Osama video has been on the net for quite some time already, and they’ve only just found out (got this from news), everything is getting on the Net nowadays…
If you told me that 10 years ago, I would have called you a retard, but now? Hmm…plausible
Nevertheless, wipe those terrorists out
Geez Duncan, I cant recall a day where you had this many posts.
As for the terrorists, they are evil people who will use ANY means necessary to plan and execute attacks. Today it is SL, tomorrow it will be myspace and facebook.
Well, they may not train on physical or weapon handling but they can exercise target selection, planing and logistics etc…
But then again, the internet provides vast resources on these areas. Should we ban the internet altogether?
Well at least someone is using SecondLife.
cheers
scott
I guess they’ve already forgotten about the Indian doctor they tarred and feathered without a single shred of evidence.
Just keep on pumping the fear.
Duncan – what the living heck does this have to do with TechCrunch? Mike please get rid of this guy. If I want to read this crap, I’ll visit digg.
Second Life is not a CAVE, i.e., a full-blown virtual environment; SL is a toy (and one with a lousy UI at that).
Besides, it’s probably easy enough for intelligence agencies to track, so it may be a lousy place to aggregate terrorists and for recruiting would-be terrorists.
Gee, just think: Islamist Jihadist Suicide Bomber Island next to an island for sexual perverts. Well, at least they’re all consenting adults. Second Life gets to be a bigger joke every day, a place only for the lobotimized. The fact that Newsweek finally caught up with SL hype spells doom for SL.
To the Terra Nova crowd, instead of wasting time defending SL, work on building a better virtual environment.
I haven’t played SL but if there are really jihaders on the site why can’t a bunch of other SL players get a little group together and kill the little bastards? It would be fun, patriotic, and nobody gets hurt.
The News Corp article is as hysterical as one would expect but there are some interesting issues surrounding virtual worlds and their potential use by a variety of anti-social elements. The most compelling issue right now is probably how virtual currencies can easily be used in money-laundering schemes.
As this is techcrunch I wonder how many other web 2.0 applications could be used by terrorists – is there a jihadi facebook, a shining path version of twitter?!
Either way terrorist groups and Islamist terrorist groups in particular, made some of the best use of web 1.0 so I am willing to bet they will make some use of the next wave of innovation.
While there is no published information on jihadi groups using Second Life or even discussing virtual worlds in general- other extremist elements such as white-hate groups have been ‘relatively’ active in Second Life, creating swastikas and organizing virtual lynchings. That would have made a better story as at least there is some evidence a reporter could use.
The question of how to prevent anti-social elements (from pedophiles to terrorists) exploiting web 2.0+ applications, while balancing users rights, is one that all companies in this realm will eventually have to address.
Roderick Jones
http://www.metasecurity.net
@18 is correct…
Man….. People want to fired you duncan. you are tried to scare people just to get lame attention.
This is getting wayyyyy off topic.
Yeah too bad you can’t import a perfect model of a Google 3D warehouse-stored building into SL, in order to make it rezzed and rendered with nearly exact details and create a virtual room with data from Street View to scope the surrounding areas. Oh, oops, pretend I never said that. You can’t actually do anything serious in SL, nope, it’s all penises and casinos and fur.
Anyway.
One of the first projects I saw 2 years ago in SL was a recreation of the downtown area around Dartmouth. It was a project to recreate the area for disaster response (all that crap like ‘if this parking lot was jammed, how can we set up a base of operations etc?).
With 3D modeling that is easier and more accessible than anything in the video game industry TO DATE, you wanna challenge what someone can do? And what game out there (I forget which) can have maps loaded in to help soldiers plan attacks? (A military guy at SXSW leading a panel on Serious Gaming brought this up, I just forgot the title)
And to think it used to be cute that Warcraft guilds can plan raids in SL because closed garden models like WoW won’t allow this. In fact, in gaming, your job is to shut up and consume!
Anyway, off to a perfect replica of a Chinese town or two. That’s for David.
Sorry, this terrorist attack can not be completed at this time as the grid is down for scheduled maintenance.
Please consider rescheduling your attack on our freedom at a later date..
Hey Roderick, I’d be happy to chat (ericrice / gmail) about any of that, as I could write pages and pages on what most blogs and media outlets COMPLETELY miss when it comes to subtext. The last TC article about ‘bestiality’ actually had a lot more subtext to do with Terms of Services, a lawsuit in the ninth district, and oh yeah, ban Americans from the Southern states (you gotta e-mail me for THAT one).
As long as you read SL articles and realize the most important things aren’t about SL at all, you’ll be fine.
Otherwise, go play on digg.
Australians are dumb when it comes to news and current affairs. Believe me, i live in their country and get to see it read it and listen to it every day. Damn you Rupert Murdoch!
John Doer: Second Life is one of the most hyped platforms in Web 2.0, I didn’t make it so, it is, so it’s news. As I noted at the start I’ve had just about enough of the SL stories as well…and yet they just keep on growing.
As for the premise of this post I’d note again that I didn’t say I support the news.com.au story, which is why I quoted heavily from it without providing any supporting statements…indeed I could never have come up with something this far fetched. I can’t imagine what the next accusation directed at Second Life will be, each on tops the last one without fail. Life was so much easier when Second Life issues revolved around flying penises.
I am really starting to hate Duncan’s posts.
Hey Duncan, It is good to have a variety of post gives you more broad scale of readers….SMART
in regards to terrorist they will use any form of item as a weapon. If they want to destroy they will find a way no matter what. It is all just time. Your Success, http://www.houseofhancock.com
Thanks House of Hancock
I’ve got posts about $20m going into companies today that haven’t had 1 comment in 12 hours, and people complain about Second Life coverage…go figure, or is the point lost: an terrorism expert has claimed that Second Life is being used by terrorists…it’s far fetched, sure, but the source wasn’t some obscure blog as well. And yet you know if I wrote a post about how wonderful Second Life was I’d have the same people complaining, there is absolutely no pleasing some people.
Ok, on a more serious but somewhat related note, when the Virgina Tech shooting took place for some reason I immediately thought “someone should recreate the crime scene in SL”. Not for the morbid aspects but educational and news reporting options, ok you sick fucks can enjoy it as well. While CNN can show you pretty 3D maps in between looping the same scene over and over again why not make it interactive.
Law enforcement and other schools could also participate to learn from the experience and analyze it further. Would you also consider this tool for terrorists to plan a similar attack?
News Corp in scaremongering crap-merchants shocker!
Good call on reporting this though. I think one of the things we’ve got to watch out for is the attacks on Internet services from government and traditional media. These usually come under the guise of the scaremongering topic-du-jour, be it pedophilia (with DOPA) or – in this case – terrorism. Not that those aren’t important topics, but they’re both used as covers for all kinds of hidden agendas.
I just love how they talk about people being killed or wounded in SL. Unbelievable.
How much do you wanna bet that this is the early part of an attempt to gain government regulatory control over online social networks?
I am a CIA asset. The Bush Administration is not “hunting me down”; they are protecting me! 9-11 was an inside job.
“The terrorists must get broadband in their caves now.”
Right, because the hijackers on 9/11 were living, being educated, and training overseas in caves……
Poor Second Life cant get a break.
Busted for embezzling money… investigated for gambling concerns and now they are under fire for training terrorists.
They should have stuck to porn.
Well… that would be a real catastrophe if they were to blew a virtual bus in the midst of virtual innocents…What a virtual bloodshed…
Shaken but not stirred ………
I am with Jason on this…
>> How much do you wanna bet that this
>> is the early part of an attempt to
>> gain government regulatory control
>> over online social networks?
Wow. Well, if terrorists are “training” by fighting in SL, I’d say – let them go at it. Hopefully when they reach “real life” they’ll try the same sort of stuff as in SL. “What? I can’t really fly?” “No way, if you get shot you died and there is no restart button.”
Your blog got media coverage in Austria.
http://derstand...rl=/?id=2982608 (german)
And you guy’s got linked to at the US Army’s BCKS site.
nice
nice demek yetmes tesekkurde etmek lasim
How much do you wanna bet that this is the early part of an attempt to gain government regulatory control over online social networks?
I think I saw a preview for a movie talking about some online social network taking over the government.. or was i dreaming? i did eat a pizza last night :p
web designer, in my oppinion you are absolutely right.
2 things i want to say:
- my group in secondlife was associated with another group in secondlife, last group using the word “wolves” in their titles. some person (who i really consider close to a terrorist because it ruins businesses and friendships between sims and sim owners, leading to a lower cash-flow overall) accused the “… wolves” group of being sam ehting as Grey Wolves terrorist organization in RL. somehting that we all should know is that mongols, turks, asian and european nations will call them selves “wolves” because is in their legends as they are born from wolf and deer for example. Grey Wolves are terrorists, Turkish Wolves are humanitarian association saving lives after natural cataclisms, “… wolves” is a group of fantasy roleplay in secondlife, they roleplay vampires and lycans and also the ottoman empire in around 1500. – (now i guess is useless to start a talk about how much Al Quaeda would love to be online playing as lycans and warewolves and vampires… hahah)
- this association i speak about was also made by “those are muslims” reason, therefore i call it racism. i am orthodox, many europeans are in that group and mine, orthodox, catholics, muslims, pagans, atheists – we all try to have fun, all are accepted and accepting each other. all of us filed so so so many tickets to lindenlab with no official answer yet.
so here are some points i thought about:
- when i have an intersim action roleplay and i know that person will be there, i prefer not to go and stop my group to do so. this results in less business relationships between sim owners, less traffic which means less sales etc…
- how can a person be so fee to accuse such serious matters on people like him… i have to put a quote here: “Let`s leave the pedophiles and secret bestalists alone under one condition: that other players can hunt them down and put virtual bullets into their virtual brains.
OH…but that’d be offensive, wouldn’t it?”
- how come such person finds adepts that follow blindly without any proof… isn`t it a fault of society…?
there`s much more to be said… i would like to share thoughts with you guys…