...of people stealing nuclear warheads on City of Villains? They could be used against targets in Paragon City or lead to renewed hostilities against the Rikti! Truly, we have to spy on people in the real world to prevent video game WMDs from being used.

My fear of terrorists is that they are monomaniacal extremists hell-bent on achieving their goals at any cost. If they are surfing the internets then I feel a lot better. The internet is probably the most distracting thing ever invented by mankind, and getting terrorists hooked on it should be a national priority. "Dude, I'll go blow up that building after my Lost torrent finishes, I swear!"

Imaginary terrorists seem to be the raison d'etre for the GOP these days.

Spy on everyone or the internet'll blow up Walmart!

Seems as rational as the rest of the fear-is-freedom message.

That article in the Australian was the first (and most hilariously idiotic) in a string of articles warning about terrorists in Second Life starting last year. The Australian is owned by Rupert Murdoch's News Corp which also happens to own MySpace (and Fox News). The article appeared at the peak of the giant wave of media hype SL was receiving and its resultant meteoric rise in popularity. SL and MySpace are, in a sense, competitors in the social networking space. My reaction to the article (when I stopped laughing uncontrollably) was that it was nothing more than a typical Faux News style hit job inspired not by some naive but honest fear, but deliberate and cynical fear mongering motivated by corporate greed. No one capable of tying their own shoes, let alone getting a job at a newspaper, could possibly be enough of a gibbering idiot to have written that piece for any other reason (except perhaps satire). Every similar article that's appeared since then has simply been a rehash of the original, born of laziness and cheap sensationalism. It's always easier to copy someone else's stupidity than to come up with your own. The whole thing is a sad commentary on what passes for news these days. Thanks for bucking the trend.

Juan Cole shows that the US government neither understands virtual reality, nor can it function in a virtuous reality. Even internet game sites are a threat to it. It is time for disorganized resistance - http://etresoi.ch/Denis/disorganisation.html

I agree with the point that training and recruiting in MMOs (Massively Multiplayer Online games) is not likely to occur. You would be much more likely to be recruited by a spotty 14 year old than an actual terrorist.

The area where there is potential for mischief is in communications. In games (and other internet tools like TeamSpeak), it is very easy to have either a voice or text conversation (depending on the game or tool) with the other players. It would be extremely difficult to track terrorist-related discussions in these environments.

For example, two (or more) people are discussing tactics for taking some major objective. It would be trivially easy to develop an easy code that would be indistinguishable from other game-related chatter. This code would be very hard to break (or even identify) and the people in question could always claim they were just playing the game.

I talk to people all over the world on a regular basis while playing multiplayer games and I am very confident that no intelligence agency would even notice if I was planning to do illegal acts. If I were to do this over a standard phone, I have no doubt that the use of certain keywords might generate a response from intelligence agencies.

Both my husband and I play World of Warcraft as a way of unwinding and having fun. I thought that he was kidding when he told me that the government was going to be looking at MMOs as a possible terrorist threat based upon an article he read. As a matter of fact I laughed it off, it is just too ridiculous and far fetched. But then again, I guess that I should not dismiss anything that comes out about what the government is planning to do.

The fact that the government thinks that games like these are "terrorist" tools are laughable on it's face. How in the heck is a bunch of 13 year old kids and adults seeking some escape a terrorist threat? Yes, there is such a thing as Ventrilo, Teamspeak and in game chat that is used by people who play high level characters in guilds that stratgeize while playing different end game content and telling off color jokes, but that is it.

Honestly, they will never get anywhere, in my opinion, by monitoring MMOs, unless they believe that a bunch of 13 year old kids and adults seeking a form of entertainment to help them unwind is also a "terrorist threat". But then again, I guess that anything that gives people some joy and escape from the nightmare that the world can be at times would be seen as a possible threat by people who themselves don't know what it is to relax and have some fun. Better to evesdrop, interecept innocent communication and threaten people who are just going through their day to day lives as best they can. What a sad, sorry, sick and twisted bunch.

EntropyMonkey may well have a good point here.

Juan Cole understands a great deal about many thing but virtual worlds may not be one of them.

Communication not only for planning, and couching that in terms of fictional operations in a game, but intelligence gathering is a real possibility. I game with folks in the military and in government. Most people know better than to talk much about themselves but it can become inevitable. And imagine an al Qaida operative (or just some con artist - as has happened before) creating some sexy female avatar and seducing the characters of players who turn out to have some military or governmental background.

Laugh all you want but cybersex is real and people not only hook up online but sometimes in real life as well. I can't count how many married couples I know that have met up in a game.

And if you don't think people talk about stuff they shouldn't to people they don't know in a game - remember that Bush administration official who confessed about her inappropriate political favoritism to a Guild mate online?

World of Warcraft (not a wargame - the term wargame deals mostly with strategic single-player games featuring historical themes), though, is really far from ideal for those guys. If you wanted to couch discussions of missions and attacks in game terms you'd have to try real hard to get real world analogies going there - it's a very static and unrealistic game so abberations and creative thinking would stand out. A better bet would be Eve Online which has dynamic PvP warfare and real economies. Thus, economic and psychological warfare have real roles. People talk about suicide attacks and blowing up facilities all the time - if not necessarily in the same sense a terrorist would.

All that said, though, is this really the easiest way for terrorists to do their thing? Would they really want to pass through US pipelines where everything they say and do might be hoovered up? And MMORPGs are so high profile they'd almost be too obvious.

No. I'd look for lower tech answers. Look for text-based MOOs and MUDs run on servers outside of the U.S. Many of the same advantages with a much lower chance of anyone ever figuring out what was up. They could even set up and run one of their own, controlling access and power. A wizard, the guy who controls just about everything on a MUD, might well get someone willing to talk about anything in order to get a few extra levels or a magic item if they're caught up enough in what's going on. Especially if there's a "honey trap" element in there too in the form of an admiring player or administrator.

Just some random thoughts.