Al-Qaida Recruiting Target: Skilled Hackers
Doug Tsuruoka Thu Aug 18, 7:00 PM ET Investors Business Daily
Excerpt:

"Simultaneous physical and electronic attacks impair the ability to respond to a terror attack. If you cripple power to hospitals while casualties are being treated, the result is more terror... Plans were recovered in Afghanistan that showed al-Qaida wanted to attack networks in the U.S. that controlled so-called SCADA systems....SCADA stands for supervisory control and data acquisition. These are computer networks that control heating, ventilation, power generation, air conditioning and the like. They also control things like dam gates."

Since the idea of terrorists eyeing hospitals as secondary targets is a known strategy, it all makes me wonder why a former director with a F.T.O. (foreign terrorist org) was able to get a gig working in the central adminstrative office of the NYC Health and Hospitals Corporation (HHC). A foreign intelligence expert told me in our recent meeting in DC that he had no idea where this "dangerous" individual was. I subsequently discovered he lives in Belle Mead, NJ and commutes to this fabulous gig. (The HHC oversees 10 acute care hospitals and other medical facilities including those with Level 1 emergency rooms, burn and trauma units and units for dealing with urban catastrophes. )

Since competition for these jobs is fierce, with as many as 40,000 applicants per position, and acknowledging the fact that no doubt this man would say he knew nothing whatsoever of the terrorist group's true intent, one can only marvel at the fact that such a former affiliation is not at all considered a blemish on one's record.

He was never of any investigative interest to the FBI, who never detained, questioned or charged him. Note: When the FBI searched one of the offices of the al Qaeda-linked org, they found a 1999 Seattle Times article about use of smallpox as a bioweapon and how ill-prepared US hospitals were to deal with the threat. That info was highlighted.