Indian police arrest ‘Islamic State jihadi tweeter’

Indian police on Saturday arrested a 24-year-old believed to be the handler of an influential Twitter account supporting the Islamic State militant group, officials said.

Mehdi Masroor Biswas, who works for an Indian food conglomerate in the southern city of Bangalore, is alleged to be behind the Twitter account @ShamiWitness.

The account had 17,700 followers, including many foreigners fighting for the Islamic State group in Syria and Iraq, until it was shut down following a report by Britain’s Channel 4 News on Thursday.

Tweets from @ShamiWitness contained jihadist propaganda as well as information for would-be recruits and messages praising fallen fighters as martyrs.

Police raided Biswas’ house in an upscale suburb of Bangalore early Saturday and seized his mobile phone, laptop and other documents for evidence.

“On the basis of credible intelligence inputs … we have apprehended Mehdi Masroor Biswas from his rented one-room apartment,” police Director General L.R. Pachuau said at a news conference. “He has confessed to the fact that he was operating Shami Witness Twitter account for the last many years … he used to work in the office in the day and became active on the Internet late at night.”

http://www.japantimes.co.jp/news/2014/12/13/asia-pacific/indian-police-arrest-islamic-state-jihadi-tweeter/

Worth noting he was not unmasked by the FBI, the NSA or any other participant in the trillion dollar national security state but was un-masked by some reporters from channel 4.

http://www.channel4.com/news/unmasked-the-man-behind-top-islamic-state-twitter-account-shami-witness-mehdi