I think it was about a week ago where I talked about the idea of an electronic jihad taking place in early November.  While a lot of people thought it was just talk, it looks like some researchers at McAfee discovered a program openly available called ‘Electronic Jihad 3.0′.  From the description, this software sounds more like a game than an attack mechanism.  After all, by referring people to the jihad, you score ‘points’.  What’s the point of having points?  Well, it sounds like it could be an ego trip so people can brag that they got more points than other people…like in a video game.

Security researchers say they have discovered a program that could be used by Islamic terrorists to launch data attacks against Western targets.

The “Electronic Program of Jihad,” as its creators have dubbed it, asks for a username and password once it’s installed, according to this entry on the McAfee Avert Labs Blog. The program, quoted as version 3.0, then tries to join a cyber jihadist website that coordinates the attack. Loyal users can even score bonus points by referring newcomers.

The revelation comes two weeks after Israeli news website Debkafile reported calls by an Islamist website for true believers to mount electronic attacks on “Western, Jewish, Israeli, Muslim apostate and Shiite websites”. Rather than launching the assault through a network of compromised PCs, the organizers reportedly plan to supply a package called Electronic Jihad Version 2.0 that volunteers could use to unleash denial-of-service attacks against the targets.[more]

Tags: Hackers