Intelligence officials use cellphone signals to track Al Qaeda operatives, as number of mid-level arrests rises. An ordinary-looking grid map of Riyadh adorns one wall of a command-and-control center deep inside a government building in Saudi Arabia’s capital. The map is higher-tech than it appears at first glance. Tiny embedded lights flash red when certain cellphones – those belonging to suspected terrorists – initiate or receive a call. Teams of officials from Saudi Arabia, the FBI, the CIA, and the US Treasury Department decide instantly whether simply to watch and listen to the suspected terrorist – or to send in screaming police cars to nab him. So far, officials say, this technology – and others – has enabled them to interrupt several terror plots and nab dozens of suspected terrorists. Certainly it hasn’t served as a panacea, as the attacks on foreign workers in Saudi Arabia’s oil-worker compounds last weekend show. At least 22 people, including one American, were killed when terrorists stormed a compound where foreign oil workers lived. One terrorist was captured, while three others escaped using hostages as shields. Full Story
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