Technology, Terrorism, and Crime (Apa). Technology, Terrorism,

Technology, Terrorism, and Crime (APA).

Technology, Terrorism, and Crime

One of the most heinous terrorist groups currently operating in the U.S. In called the "Aryan Nations." This group openly states on their website that they have been "Fighting Jewish Takeover for over 35 years." (aryan-nation.org) This group of domestic terrorists post articles on their website with grammatically incorrect titles like "The menace of Multiculturalism," and "Jews that control Hollywood: Meet the filthy Kikes are behind that industry." (aryan-nation.org) There is no doubt that his group is one that is dedicated to ideals of Adolph Hitler and the supremacy of the Aryan race. This group has also used the latest technology to spread their message of hate.

The Aryan Nations is a far right white supremacist religious organization based on the teachings of Wesley Swift, who founded a church based on anti-Semitism in California in the 1940's. In the 1970's, Richard Girnt Butler founded the Aryan Nations as part of Swift's church, renamed the Church of Jesus Christ-Christian. The Federal Bureau of Investigation has determined that the Aryan Nations is a terrorist threat, and others have called it the "first truly nationwide terrorist network in the U.S." ("Extremism in America")

Along with Butler, other leaders of this organization were Neuman Britton, elected leader in 1998. However, Butler dismissed him and brought in Harold Ray Redfeairn to replace him. Redfeairn then made the mistake of allowing an FBI informant into the group, who later exposed much of the groups activities. The distrusted Redfeairn allied with August Kries to form a splinter group, but returned a few months later. The group is currently split into three main factions, one led by August Kries in Pennsylvania. A second faction is called the Phineas Priesthood, and is based in New York State, while the third faction is based in Idaho and Texas and headed by Pastors Jay Farber and Jerald O'Brien.

The Aryan Nations has used technology to spread it's message of hate and intolerance. As mentioned before, the Aryan Nation maintains a website which allows the most vile and heinous posts. "Jew Jokes," and other such insultingly intolerant pages display the crudeness and lack of general tact on the part of these terrorists. The website displays pages which openly call for murder, terrorism, and acts of cruelty aimed at Jews, African-Americans, and other minorities. Worse than the vile website, which must be actively search for to gain access, was their weekly radio program called "The Aryan Nations Broadcast." The openness of the airwaves allows for anyone, of any age to be subject to the hate espoused by these racist terrorists. Children, who could not understand that those they're hearing on the radio were bad people, might have been influenced by the seduction of evil.

Luckily for the people of the United States, the broadcast, which ran from 1999 to 2009, was shutdown when the host, Hal Turner, was arrested for threatening federal judges. ("Extremism in America") But shutting this group down for good has proven to be somewhat difficult. Even after the Southern Poverty Law Center won a $6 million judgment against the group for beating a woman and her son, the group still remains a threat. Associates of this group have created splinter groups with the idea of bringing about a race war. Robert Jay Matthews, along with Dan Bauer, Randy Duey, Denver Parmenter, and Bruce Pierce formed a group called "The Order," and embarked on a series of violent crimes. Matthews was later killed in a shootout with the police, but some of his followers still remain active.

But it is not only terrorist who use technology to accomplish their evil goals, criminals also do so, and with a greater frequency. Criminals steal the identities of innocent people, and then use that identity to commit a number of types of fraud. There are a number of cases of this type of crime including the case of an unidentified woman who posted her story online for everyone to learn from.

In this case of identity theft, the person's "SSN, DOB, Mother maiden name, Discover Card number and security check were compromised." ("Identity Theft") The thieves changed address information at the Discover Card's website, but the victim was only informed when Discover called them to ask about some questionable purchases. There were two ways in which the thieves could have obtained the information: first, when the victim applied for a credit card at a national chain store and used the Discover card as a credit reference, or when the victim tried to log into their discover account and found the password didn't work. They then went through the Discover checks, which required all that information, and changed their password.

As result of the theft of their identity, the thieves were able to make a significant amount of purchases using the victim's identity. The victim was then forced to spend a considerable amount of time calling all the stores where the fraudulent purchases took place, gaining all the information necessary, contacting the three major credit monitoring services and going through the procedures they required, and eventually having Discover close their account and issue a new card. Discover never even fully investigated to discover the thieves' identity, something they must do if they want to discourage others from engaging in similar fraud.

The victim should not have used their Discover Card, along with all it's information, as a credit reference for the store credit card. The information could have been stolen somewhere in the store. Secondly, when the victim had difficulty logging on to their Discover account, they should have contacted the company first and inquired why their password was not working. And finally, since the information could have been taken from the victim's computer when they changed their Discover password, they should have had appropriate anti-theft software on their computer to make certain thieves could not access the information.

While in the previous case the thieves were never identified, there is a case where the identity thieves were not only identified, but turned out to be the victims' neighbors. In a quiet California town Lara Love and David Jackson moved into an upscale neighborhood and "started stealing their neighbors' mail and pirating Internet access from the family next door to establish phony accounts in others' names…" (Squires) The couple also broke into cars, stealing credit cards but leaving the wallets behind.

Through use of the internet, which they hijacked from their neighbors wireless modem, this couple racked up around $15,000 in bills and left it to their neighbors to pay. Bryn Young, one of the couple's neighbors and victims stated that "these crimes are an assault on the community in which we live…" (Squires) But indicating the true sense of loss felt by the victims was Denise Elerick, who stated that while money can be replaced, her "trust, sense of safety in my home, joy and lightheartedness- these things take time." (Squires)