Catching Terrorists in Second Life?

Catching Terrorists in Second Life?

By Mohammed Yahia Editor - IslamOnline.net

The virtual world of Second Life (SL) is remarkably different from the real world in many ways. Not only can you fly or teleport between islands, but also can change the appearance of your avatar at will. When you enter the virtual world, you may leave your real identity at the door. You can be anyone or anything you want to be inside. This is the main thing that attracted me to the virtual world a few months ago. I became a new person much fitter than my real-life self! And that is what every one else is doing. They are living their dreams, doing the things that they cannot do in real life. Following the SL logo of "Your World, Your Imagination," people have come up with all kind of strange things in-world. You have griffins and dragons for transportation as well as UFOs. But you also have weapons turning up that can do serious damage to avatars and buildings in the virtual 3D world. Weapons are not new in SL, nor are they new in virtual worlds in general, such as World of Warcraft. There are dozens of duals taking place on SL and, as one duelist there once told me, "you have to come prepared." Her text blinked up on my screen as she packed her semi-automatic rifle and AK-47 and pulled out a huge RPG! Lately, however, police and intelligence services have been eyeing SL, claiming it has been "infiltrated" by terrorists. They did not explain how they arrived to this sinister conclusion, given that nearly every one in SL is adopting a different identity than in real life. This poses a very serious question: Are they watching and collecting data on people who visit SL? And if that is the case, then are they monitoring all 8.5 million residents (the name given to users inside SL) or are they screening for people who could be "terrorists"? On May 22, 2007, there was an attack on the Australian Broadcasting Corporation's (ABC) offices inside SL. It was the first virtual terrorism attack in-world. A group of people dropped a virtual nuclear bomb on ABC's island (virtual place inside SL), leveling it all except for a single communication tower. A group calling themselves the Second Life Liberation Army claimed responsibility for the attack. Until recently, those people were only regarded as "geeky teenagers" with too much time on their hands. But a report on the Sunday Times published on August 5, 2007, said that some experts blame this attack on real-life Islamist radicals. Now, all of a sudden, the attack that took place months ago has become important again. It is not being blamed on geeks anymore, it is now the international media's favorite topic: Islamists and terrorism. No one has explained how that deduction came about. There are hundreds — if not thousands — of residents in-world who carry weapons on them. My dueling friend was telling me she spends around US$3000 on weapons every couple of months. She is not alone either; according to her, that is the average that duelers pay. They travel to special islands where they fight. They sometimes even used to gamble on who is going to win; that is, of course, before gambling was banned in SL. In real life, my dueling friend is a 19-year-old girl who probably has never even seen a real gun. Inside SL, she is a killer who boasts on how many residents she has blasted! And herein lies the problem. How can you label someone a terrorist inside a virtual world? And how can you extend that label to real life when people are creating completely different alter identities in SL compared to their real world? This raises the issue of monitoring and screening. Most Muslims are already subjected to ethnical screening in almost all airports around the world, even if they do not have the stereotyped long beard. Has this screening extended to SL? Rohan Gunaratna, a terrorism expert at the International Centre for Political Violence and Terrorism Research (ICPVTR) in Singapore, said thathe had been monitoring "12 jihadists" inside SL for the past three months. The question that begs to be asked is: How did Gunaratna figure that these avatars belong to the terrorists in the first place? Terrorism Training In-World If screening is conducted inside SL, then on what basis is it taking place? There are no clear ethnical variations inside SL, since you can choose to completely change your avatar's looks in a few minutes. Terrorism experts are worried that "radical figures" may be pursuing terrorism training within the confines of SL. Experts expect that after the dismantling of training camps in Afghanistan, terrorists have gone online to train in virtual worlds. Some experts even think that the attack on ABC was a training or simulation for something the terrorists are preparing in real life. But there is a serious flaw to this point. Training on terrorism in SL does not substitute real-life training. Blowing things up inside SL consists mainly of choosing the "bomb" from a resident's infinite backpack, right-clicking on the target, then choosing an option from a circular menu that pops up. That is all there is to it. It makes sense when experts say many terrorists travel to Iraq to get practice on the field, but how does blowing things up in SL give them any training? In this context, it makes more sense that these virtual terrorism attacks are executed by "geeky teenagers" vying to prove who has created better virtual weaponry. After all, virtual worlds are full of such competitions. Besides, if SL was being as closely monitored as evident from what many experts said, then it would make sense that this is not where terrorists would be. With the amount of funding and technological know-how they are claimed to have,it would make sense they'd have their own networks. Setting up a virtual world is not that complicated anymore, there are already dozens online. For many Muslims who are irritated by the constant screening wherever they go, it will be very annoying to know they are even being monitored in the virtual worlds they escape to. Kevin Zuccato, head of the Australian government's High Tech Crime Centre, called for closer surveillance in virtual worlds. "We need to start thinking about living, working and protecting two worlds and two realities," he told a security industry conference in Sydney, Australia. In this case, this would spell the end of the anonymity that people in SL enjoy right now. The question will remain how do you label a terrorist in-world? If they start screening people, will they capture and charge my duelist friend who has killed dozens of "people" while playing in SL? Or will they charge the bombers of the ABC island in-world? Chances are that these are just little children who are playing too much videogames. Where should the red line be drawn between the real world and a virtual one?