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Comment by griffordson | Hacker News Reader

Did you read the Guardian report?

http://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/aug/01/new-york-police...

  Members of what she described as a "joint terrorism task
  force" descended on Catalano's home on Wednesday. A spokesman
  for the FBI told to the Guardian on Thursday that its
  investigators were not involved in the visit, but that "she
  was visited by Nassau County police department … They were
  working in conjunction with Suffolk County police 
  department."

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That wasn't the linked story on this thread, but I found this bit interesting :

  A spokesman for the FBI told to the Guardian on 
  Thursday that its investigators were not involved 
  in the visit, but that "she was visited by Nassau 
  County police department … They were working in
  conjunction with Suffolk County police department.

But it was only after the story ran that she Tweeted this : https://twitter.com/inthefade/status/362707932586053633

So FBI became JTTF, which in turn became Nassau cops?

This is why we should all stop listening to the 24 hour news machine and wait a while before everything is cleared up and fully presented. This is a developing story and clinging to one or two tidbits finagled from the authorities here and there aren't going to cut it.

From FBI's website: "The New York Joint Terrorism Task Force brings together representatives of 49 local, state, and federal agencies to run down any and all terrorism leads, develop and investigate cases, provide support for special events, and proactively identify threats that may impact the area and the nation. We also have satellite Joint Terrorism Task Forces working out of Long Island, Westchester County, and Orange County." Source: http://www.fbi.gov/newyork/about-us/our-partnerships/partner...

It makes full sense that the FBI would get a report and share with local law enforcement (members of JTTF) to follow up. I'm still very skeptical that this all originated with google searches, but the story of "JTTF agents" checks out.

What do you think "Joint" in "Joint Terrorism Task Force" stands for? It's FBI working with local Police Departments, which in this case sounds like tipping off the PD to go check her out.

Again, according to a retired FBI exec with experience in terrorism work at FBI, the term "JTTF" might mean almost nothing at all.

Who would the JTTF be made up of?

While I see where you're going with this, let's take a moment to remember that the Joint Terrorism Task Force is made up of individual law enforcement officers, not agencies. That is to say that not all members of the Whatever County Sheriff's Department are inherently part of the Joint Terrorism Task Force.

So it's certainly possible that three black SUVs worth of the local sheriff's deputies, all of whom were members of the Joint Terrorism Task Force, showed up to question her about her internet searching.

Or this fiction writer is not portraying an accurate version of the events.

Basically, it's a modern day "posse" made up of individuals from Federal law enforcement (FBI, Secret Service, ICE, Border Patrol, etc) and from local or specialized law enforcement (railroad police, etc).

The officers are basically deputized as JTTF members. It's a common model that's been around for a long time. For example, the US Marshalls have a fugitive task force for picking up suspects with arrest warrants and the DEA has something similar for drug raids.

According to David Gomez, a former FBI exec who worked in domestic terrorism, "JTTF" is a catchall term used by many (perhaps all) LEOs working on terrorism in any capacity. The term apparently has no technical meaning.

ok so when can i think/share thoughts with other thinkers? is there a specific authority you are waiting for?

So apparently local police forces have access to the kind of data required to learn what people are searching for.

I read the report, it's still a single-source story from the person involved and their interpretation of what happened.

The comment I replied to said this:

  Just *who* came to the residence beyond some scary 
  looking guys in SUVs who said they were FBI.

The Guardian report, which was referred to in the comment I replied to, answered that question with quite a bit of specificity.

That comment also had the complaint about downvotes for asking for evidence before I replied.

I agree that there is no concrete evidence that the police showed up as a direct result of them searching for specific keywords. There probably never will be. But how would she prove it? Could anyone prove it in public? Would any investigation that looked into the matter ever be declassified? Could Congress hold a hearing in open session and get answers about the incident?

Unless her husband had a recording of the conversation she claims happened here:

  "Have you ever looked up how to make a pressure cooker 
  bomb?" My husband, ever the oppositional kind, asked them 
  if they themselves weren’t curious as to how a pressure 
  cooker bomb works, if they ever looked it up. Two of them 
  admitted they did.

https://medium.com/something-like-falling/2e7d13e54724

Or unless one of the officers involved in that conversation confirms the conversation happened as she reported, we'll never know.

It is completely reasonable to be skeptical of her interpretation of the event. But it is also reasonable to wonder about the consequences of living in a society where her interpretation is a reasonable one, even if it is unlikely. Before Snowden's leaks many people would declare her a nut for even thinking her searches could be related to the investigation. Now we have evidence that the story could happen as she presented it, even if it didn't in this case.

You're correct about that.

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