Terror watchResearchers tout efficacy of reporting suspicious activity in foiled terror plots

Following the death of Osama bin Laden and with fears of a retaliatory attack on the rise, public policy researchers are touting the efficacy of the new “See Something Say Something” campaign which encourages individuals to report any suspicious activity they see.

John S. Hollywood, a researcher at the Rand Corporation, a non-profit think tank, and Kevin J. Strom, a senior research scientist at RTI International, recently conducted a study on thwarted terrorist plots in the United States and found that more than a third were stopped because of tips from concerned citizens.

Of the sixty-eight stopped terrorist attacks from 1999 to 2009, nearly 40 percent of the plots were stopped following a report of suspicious activity.

As evidence, the researchers cited several instances where tips from family members or neighbors led to the discovery of planned terrorist acts.

For example, a clerk at Circuit City had noticed that a videotape a customer had brought in to be transferred to DVD contained footage of paramilitary training and calls for Jihad. The clerk notified authorities and investigators uncovered a plot to kill soldiers at Fort Dix, New Jersey.

In another instance, neighbors reported hearing unexplained machine gun fire near their home which led to the discovery of a plot to kill police officers in Michigan.

While Hollywood and Strom tout the efficacy of reporting terrorist activity, some critics say that the “See Something Say Something” campaign inundates law enforcement officials with tips that could take valuable time and resources from real investigations.

David Rittgers, a legal policy analyst at the Cato Institute, argues that national intelligence and law enforcement agencies are already drowning in too much information.

“While there is value in getting a person on the street to be aware and report suspicious activities, you can also create too many false positives,” he said.

According to Rittgers, the FBI receives roughly 700 tips a day while the National Counterterrorism Center receives about 10,000 pieces of information on a daily basis.

He says that adding more information to this system will not necessarily help uncover potential plots.

“People talk about connecting dots,” he explained. “But it’s knowing which dots to connect that has value… The commitment to simply collect all the dots might not be as useful as a lot of people would propose.”

As an example, Rittgers said, “It’s not illegal to purchase a ski mask, it’s not illegal to purchase a gun, it’s not illegal to sit outside a bank. But it’s when you put those all together.”

Hollywood and Strom’s research was funded by the Institute for Homeland Security Solutions, which in turn is funded by DHS.