From this article in The Australian:
“Rohan Gunaratna, author of Inside al-Qa’ida, says …[Terrorists] are rehearsing their operations in Second Life because they don’t have the opportunity to rehearse in the real world,” Gunaratna says. “And unless governments improve their technical capabilities on a par with the terrorists’ access to globalisation tools like the internet and Second Life, they will not be able to monitor what is happening in the terrorist world.”
“Kevin Zuccato, head of the Australian High Tech Crime Centre in Canberra, says terrorists can gain training in games such as World of Warcraft in a simulated environment, using weapons that are identical to real-world armaments.”
I can only hope that Rohan Gunaratna and Kevin Zuccato are being so misquoted by The Australian that they have grounds to sue, because in my opinion the only other possibility is that they are smoking the crack.
My mind reels at the concept of a terrorist attacked planned and trialled and perfected in Second Life.
“Quickly, Ahmed! We must strike at the Great Satan NOW! You put on your anthropomorphic fox avatar, and I’ll wear my Sailor Moon outfit! Don’t forget to res up your largest weapon and let us pray to Allah that the American Pig Dogs have Push Damage enabled on their land!”
“After we strike, I will escape in my 50m long flying hot dog, you leave in the opposite direction via Lightcycle! Don’t forget, if the Americans use a cage trap weapon, in Allahs name, Teleport back to base and I’ll meet you there!”
And as for Kevin Zuccato … Terrorists training in WoW? Is Al Queda training to raid Onyxia the Dragon now?
“Ahmed! I cannot believe you pulled that add! In the name of Allah, control your aggro! Minus Fifty Infidel Kill Points!”
And using weapons identical to real-world armaments? My Druid main in WoW has A Splintering Greatstaff of the Beast that increases his Attack Power by over 300 points while he’s in Cat, Bear, Dire Bear and Moonkin forms. If that kind of tech is now in the hands of Al Queda, then frankly, I lay the blame squarely at the door of the international intelligence community.
I can MAYBE see people training in something like small squad tactics, using a game like the Call of Duty series. Maybe. But SL and WoW? Not so much.
First furries and gankers, and now Al Queda. I may go back to playing Starcraft.
August 1, 2007 at 10:37 am
I’m sure you could foil any terrorist plot by flying in on your giant hotdog anyway.
August 1, 2007 at 12:55 pm
Yeah. A large component of hot dogs is pork.
August 2, 2007 at 2:55 am
tru dat!
August 3, 2007 at 4:46 am
Yea.. Muslims hate pork… it repels them. Kinda like killing a cow in front of a Hindi, eating non-kosher salmon in front of a Jew or using logic in front of anyone religious. 😉
August 3, 2007 at 5:07 am
Ha, Ha, Ha.
Kind of like having actually correct facts in a book in front of Christopher Hitchens?
http://www.takimag.com/site/article/hitchens_hubris/
😉
August 1, 2007 at 12:16 pm
“Greetings Starfigher, you have been recruited to defend the frontier against Bush and the infidel armada.”
August 1, 2007 at 1:00 pm
If that kind of tech is now in the hands of Al Queda, then frankly, I lay the blame squarely at the door of the international intelligence community.
If al Qai’da has those sorts of weapons we’re screwed. Either that or living in the Potter-verse.
I wonder if terrorists like Quake, or whatever 1st person shooter is all the rage nowadays.
August 1, 2007 at 2:12 pm
Perhaps all those suicide bombers were actually just trying to rocket-jump in real life…
August 2, 2007 at 4:22 am
Your mockery only displays your Hatred of Freedom. It’s your sort, through your unamerican skepticism and scoffery, that have unpatriotically made the President of the World and his loyal band of terror-hunting compatriots appear to be a bunch of nepotistic kneejerk retards, and not the heroic Army of Freedom that they truly are. Why don’t you go back to Foreignland where you belong?
August 2, 2007 at 10:44 am
And I wonder…
Are the Muslim extremists pointing out the millions of American Counter Strike players (not to mention the American Army game which is actually designed to recruit people primarily to fight in other peoples countries) as signs of the Great Satan – or are they too mistakenly pointing the finger at games which aren’t remotely suited for such actual combat tactics. 🙂
August 3, 2007 at 5:11 am
Re: And I wonder…
Hey look, maybe this is all a clever ruse by 16 year old terrorist recruits.
“But Nazir! We are playing WoW for Allah you see. It’s virtual practice for our future missions. Honest Nazir, honest…”