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The Typo Terrorist: Christmas Bomber allowed to fly due to a spelling error
In a report summarizing the attempted terrorist attack of December 25, 2009, it is made apparent that the software used by counter-terrorist intelligence agencies is perhaps not all that great. A month before the attack, Mr Abdulmutallab's father approached the U.S. Embassy in Nigeria to warn them about his son's slide towards radical extremism. It was at this stage that the U.S. realized that they'd spelt Mr Abdulmutallab's name wrong, and thus couldn't correlate the information his father was trying to provide with other agencies.
It isn't clear whether the typo itself caused the attempted bombing -- but it does add to the mystery. What is clear is that the software used by the U.S. government and its intelligence agencies is woefully underpowered. Dealing with transliterated non-English names is tricky at the best of times -- but to utilize a search system that doesn't allow for spelling mistakes? That's crazy -- utterly bat-shit crazy.
Maybe they should ask Google for some search tips. Or heck, just let them run the Pentagon's damn search engine.
[via Wired]
Comments
6
Subscribe to commentsDeoWulfJan 9th 2010 10:30PM
"Or heck, just let [Google] run the Pentagon's damn search engine."
Oh yeah, why not just give Google all the information we possibly can.
Sebastian AnthonyJan 9th 2010 10:40PM
I'm not sure if you're being sarcastic... :P
gollyzila99Jan 10th 2010 4:15AM
Woah woah, be careful there. You don't want to be the cause of SkyNet right?
KennethJan 10th 2010 5:17AM
Another solution is to use some common sense and wave the red flag when someone wants to fly with no luggage, no carry-on and no passport...
essjayJan 10th 2010 10:49AM
I'm calling BS on this. All the major intelligence systems from all the major vendors provide ways to mitigate against slight mis-spellings, regional variations, religious variations, typos etc. For example, IBM have Global Name Recognition (http://www-01.ibm.com/software/data/global-name-recognition/) which is for that purpose. And that's far from the best or most comprehensive available.
The trick with all this software though is that it needs to be configured and used correctly. I suspect that's where the problem lies and this is just an excuse.
Sebastian AnthonyJan 10th 2010 10:50AM
Yeah, you could imagine this is as a localized embassy issue or something -- you have to hope it's not a widespread issue :P