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Decent journalism of a sad story. What the FBI is doing exploiting these citizens having limited employment opportunities without giving them any sort of actua

Decent journalism of a sad story. What the FBI is doing exploiting these citizens having limited employment opportunities without giving them any sort of actual long-term career path to look forward to, while simultaneously exposing them to real risks and a taste of legitimacy, strikes me as unethical, immoral, and unpatriotic. They're arguably setting up conditions for this kind of outcome, whether they intend to or not. I personally suspect it's an unintended consequence of their exclusive focus on the mission. I want to feel bad for the parents but they're substantially responsible for raising such a naive fool of a son.

Nextgrid 7y ago
I would think part of the FBI's involvement here could also be to keep an eye on him. He came across as a very naive & influenceable person to me (converting to a religion, putting himself at risk by trying to meet a woman from a different country - which could've very well been a trap - woman who later tried to go into a conflict zone, going to Ukraine for <reasons>, etc)... I wouldn't be surprised if he one day ended up becoming one of the terrorists he was supposedly tracking (was he truly tracking them, or was he - maybe subconsciously - "into it" and the whole FBI thing happened to be a convenient way for him to get closer to the terrorist groups?).
- newnewpdro 7y ago
  Agreed. I'd expect them to formally hire these people and have them working as teams with proper opsec and infrastructure provided for them entirely separate from their personal lives. Instead they're left to work in isolation from home, more vulnerable to recruitment, if anything just to be treated as part of something more. There's so much wrong with the situation the FBI is cultivating here. They basically treated this kid as a criminal turned informant as terms of his freedom. That's the level of concern for his and his family's safety they seemed to exercise from my read of the article. VPNs were his only cyber protection? For all we know he was phished in a targeted attack that uncovered his true identity and affiliations.
  - 9nGQluzmnq3M 7y ago
    Such an un-Silicon Valley view. Clearly FBI is disrupting the entrenched spy industry by using innovative gig economy tactics to source diverse spy-partners from non-traditional backgrounds. 0.5 * /s
- solidsnack9000 7y ago
  Yeah, maybe they need to bring in some of the formal training that this guy obviously didn't get, including the worst case scenarios stuff.

Nextgrid 7y ago

I would think part of the FBI's involvement here could also be to keep an eye on him. He came across as a very naive & influenceable person to me (converting to a religion, putting himself at risk by trying to meet a woman from a different country - which could've very well been a trap - woman who later tried to go into a conflict zone, going to Ukraine for <reasons>, etc)... I wouldn't be surprised if he one day ended up becoming one of the terrorists he was supposedly tracking (was he truly tracking them, or was he - maybe subconsciously - "into it" and the whole FBI thing happened to be a convenient way for him to get closer to the terrorist groups?).

newnewpdro 7y ago
Agreed. I'd expect them to formally hire these people and have them working as teams with proper opsec and infrastructure provided for them entirely separate from their personal lives. Instead they're left to work in isolation from home, more vulnerable to recruitment, if anything just to be treated as part of something more. There's so much wrong with the situation the FBI is cultivating here. They basically treated this kid as a criminal turned informant as terms of his freedom. That's the level of concern for his and his family's safety they seemed to exercise from my read of the article. VPNs were his only cyber protection? For all we know he was phished in a targeted attack that uncovered his true identity and affiliations.
- 9nGQluzmnq3M 7y ago
  Such an un-Silicon Valley view. Clearly FBI is disrupting the entrenched spy industry by using innovative gig economy tactics to source diverse spy-partners from non-traditional backgrounds. 0.5 * /s
solidsnack9000 7y ago
Yeah, maybe they need to bring in some of the formal training that this guy obviously didn't get, including the worst case scenarios stuff.