Facebook and Twitter Used To Foil Olympic Terrorist Plot

Authorities in Brazil used information from two of the world’s biggest social networks in order to trap suspected terrorists who were allegedly planning an attack at the Olympic Games in Rio De Janeiro.

The judge overseeing the investigation said that both Facebook and Twitter provided information about the suspects’ social media use, according to a report by Fortune.

The Federal Police Department in Brazil has now arrested 12 suspects who are thought to have pledged allegiance to the Islamic State militant group.

It is feared that the Rio 2016 Games, which begins on 5 August, could be a target for one or more terrorist attacks.

The arrests were made as part of an ongoing investigation known as ‘Operation Hashtag’.

“The companies began to provide data related to the content of the conversations and data about where those conversations were posted,” said Judge Marcos Josegrei da Silva in a interview with Brazilian news programme Fantastico.

While both Facebook and Twitter helped Brazilian authorities to gather information on the suspects, Facebook-owned WhatsApp has been been suspended in Brazil several times for failing to hand over information requested by authorities.

The difference is that WhatsApp is an encrypted messaging service, making the data harder to access and raising issues over privacy.

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