All of these plots, successful and otherwise, contradict a prevalent theory in counter-terrorism circles that all the skills necessary to conduct a successful attack can be learned in the comfort of a terrorist’s own home. This paradigm is based on the belief that internet technology has removed the need for terrorist training camps by creating…

They gathered anxiously that first October morning, the 50 members of the class of “06-01,” the first of 750 new agents-in-training who will graduate from the FBI Academy this year. Long article that is worth the read. Anyone who has gone through military, para-military or police training can sympathize and empathize to a certain degree.…

Al Qaeda wants to build a political operation in Iraq to broaden its campaign against the U.S.-backed government, a top U.S. general said on Wednesday. Citing intelligence mostly gathered since the death of al Qaeda’s former leader Abu Musab al-Zarqawi in June, Major General William Caldwell said the militant group appeared to be refining its…

In a classroom at the FBI Academy in Quantico, instructor Rodney Loose was trying to introduce the history of Islam to a new group of future agents. He had one hour. The 50 men and women would be joining the ranks of an agency whose top officials have declared fighting terrorism to be its No.…

The great need for qualified computer security personnel is now forcing the government to rethink rigid hiring guidelines. At the Defcon computer security convention in Las Vegas, more than a dozen federal agents told attendees that traditional requirements like college degrees and polygraph tests were no longer strictly required for government employment. They also said…

A top level security probe is under way after a 12-year-old boy walked on to a plane unchecked with no documents at the height of the terror scare. The boy boarded a plane at Gatwick on Monday despite airport security being on red-alert.   Want more data points that support the idea that – mechanical…

The director of the Canadian Security Intelligence Service said Tuesday that the spy agency avoids racial profiling because it is “fundamentally stupid” and does not knowingly use information gleaned under torture offshore because the practice is “morally repugnant.” James Judd told a gathering of Canadian judges on Tuesday that he is “acutely aware” of complaints…

In my embargoed contribution to a pending book on reform, I argue that going the networked/wiki-ed/blogged route is both a nice way to cut out a lot of the overhead associated with the intel process. As it works now it is very hierarchical, with gatekeepers at every turn and operating at a pace that makes tortoises look…

So controversial is the forthcoming National Intelligence Estimate on Iraq, say officials and observers, that even the terms of reference are likely to be the subject of intense, but highly secret, discussion and debate. Somewhere in a conference room in Northern Virginia, roughly two-dozen seniors and their backups are sitting around a table and bickering…

The plot has also revealed the indispensability of good counterterrorism intelligence. A defense against terrorists, as against other enemies of the nation, must be multilayered to have a reasonable chance of being effective. One of the outer defenses is intelligence, designed to detect plots in advance so that they can be thwarted. One of the…