We now know that terrorists have found ways of hiding communications encoded in financial transactions.
Never mind the evidence for the prevalence of this problem; weʼre only beginning to uncover the threat. For now, itʼs clearly a technical possibility. Even Paypal have done it for years. Each single figure in an arbitrary decimal sum can represent four and a half bits of digital character information; the essential, brief command messages sent between terrorist cells can therefore easily be hidden in a few purchases between sock-puppet traders on eBay, Etsy and Amazon. We know this sort of activity goes on, for all sorts of reasons.
But now weʼve realised that stock exchange high speed trading is also a perfect medium. The volume of transactions is such that, with customised trading software, they can hide enormous amounts of data about targets, how to get round security systems, where to get the latest training videos and when. And letʼs face it, terrorism is well-funded by certain interests with connections to people we know have access to a share of our oil wealth. It might be time we did something about that. Finish the job.
And not only stock exchanges. Consumer-grade bank accounts can be used. A disturbingly high proportion of the population now has these, and theyʼre all available over the internet. Potential terrorists with no police record, no record of anything apart from walking past security cameras with abnormal features, could now be simply logging into a superstructure of terrorism command and control networks through their online bank accounts, sending a few pennies at a time in any currency, according to some master plan dictated to them by unidentified controllers. Remember, we donʼt have total surveillance yet. We donʼt know what theyʼre really doing in the gaps when weʼre not watching them. Donʼt believe the naïve suggestion that the larger planning instructions can only be disseminated in the media weʼve already succeeded in monitoring. If only it were that simple...
Clearly, thereʼs only one thing to be done if we are to give our children the secure future they deserve. We have to take control of the stock markets.