Skip to content
benjf.com
benjf.com

Real content from a human brain

  • Home
  • About
  • ✞ Faith
  • Opinion
    • Politics
    • Health
    • Movies
    • Music
    • ☺ For Fun
    • Random Awesomeness
  • Technology
    • Desktop
    • Android
    • ✉ Email
    • Privacy
    • Programming
      • HTML
      • CSS
      • Javascript
        • jQuery
      • PHP
      • SQL
        • SQL Server
      • Powershell
      • MS Access
      • WordPress
  • Productivity
benjf.com

Real content from a human brain

The Conman That Scared the Nation

Writer #1, 2009-12-21

Newsweek

Remember the ugly feeling you used to get in the pit of your stomach after 9/11 every time a new video message from Osama bin Laden or his top deputy, Ayman al-Zawahiri, appeared on TV? One reason we became conditioned to dread these spectral broadcasts was that the government itself told us to be frightened: Bush administration officials quietly, and sometimes not so quietly, spread word that the bin Laden videos, which usually made their way to the outside world via the Arabic satellite news channel Al-Jazeera, could contain secret messages to Qaeda “sleeper cells,” signaling them to proceed with long-planned attacks against American targets. If you think back carefully, no American official ever produced convincing proof that the videos actually contained hidden messages from bin Laden. But nobody ever conclusively demonstrated that they didn’t.

Now, however, Aram Roston, a former network-news investigative producer and biographer of Iraqi political manipulator Ahmed Chalabi, reports that some of the Bush administration’s paranoia about hidden terrorist messages was the work of a con man. According to a long article Roston has just published in Playboy, at least some of the government’s concern about the alleged secret Al-Jazeera messages was the product of a sales job by a now-bankrupt “self-proclaimed scientist” who managed to get the government to pay him for computer software that he claimed could unravel hidden “bar codes” embedded in Al-Jazeera’s broadcast signal.

Working first with a software company headed by a former associate of fallen junk-bond king Michael Milken and later with the financial backing of a wealthy Washington, D.C., socialite, Roston says that Dennis Montgomery claimed, with no supporting evidence, to have produced intelligence that sparked several memorable government terror alerts.

Sooner or later, most if not all of the agencies that he was dealing with concluded that Montgomery, who had no real training in cryptography or computer science, was peddling bunk, and they terminated his contracts. The CIA, which felt compelled, like much of the rest of the government in the wake of 9/11, to take a serious look at any possible sources, however outlandish, for intelligence on forthcoming attacks (particularly plots against airliners), didn’t take too long to conclude that Montgomery’s science was dubious. Roston reports the agency showed him the door five years ago after its scientists, working with counterparts in French intelligence, concluded that Montgomery’s claims about hidden Al-Jazeera messages could not be substantiated. But Roston says other agencies continued to bite, with the Pentagon signing a contract with Montgomery as recently as January 2009. Two lawyers representing Montgomery did not respond to messages from NEWSWEEK requesting comment. The CIA declined to comment.

Opinion

Post navigation

Previous post
Next post

Leave a Reply Cancel reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

Recent Posts

  • Love Never Fails
  • FIXED! Left Audio Only on OBS with Behringer U-Phoria UMC204HD
  • Gnome Alt+Tab Window Switching; How to ungroup the windows
  • Pay or else
  • 1Password App Integration With Browser Extension on Kubuntu (or Debian Linux)

Recent Comments

  1. LOL on Major Federal Budget Cuts – do the math
  2. Writer #1 on Online Privacy In The United States
  3. More About Sortable Dates; Plus AutoHotKey Scripts! – benjf.com on Date/Time Formatting Can Unite The World
  4. AutoHotKey Tips – benjf.com on Date/Time Formatting Can Unite The World
  5. Kevin on Moving FDLAUNCHERLOG in SQL Server

Archives

  • May 2025
  • April 2025
  • March 2025
  • February 2025
  • January 2025
  • December 2024
  • November 2024
  • October 2024
  • September 2024
  • August 2024
  • July 2024
  • June 2024
  • April 2024
  • March 2024
  • November 2023
  • October 2023
  • September 2023
  • July 2023
  • June 2023
  • May 2023
  • October 2022
  • September 2022
  • August 2022
  • May 2022
  • December 2021
  • November 2021
  • September 2021
  • July 2021
  • June 2021
  • April 2021
  • March 2021
  • February 2021
  • January 2021
  • December 2020
  • October 2020
  • September 2020
  • August 2020
  • July 2020
  • June 2020
  • May 2020
  • April 2020
  • February 2020
  • January 2020
  • December 2019
  • November 2019
  • October 2019
  • July 2019
  • May 2019
  • April 2019
  • January 2019
  • December 2018
  • November 2018
  • May 2018
  • April 2018
  • February 2018
  • December 2017
  • September 2017
  • June 2017
  • May 2017
  • February 2017
  • January 2017
  • December 2016
  • August 2016
  • July 2016
  • May 2016
  • April 2016
  • March 2016
  • February 2016
  • December 2015
  • September 2015
  • August 2015
  • July 2015
  • June 2015
  • October 2013
  • September 2013
  • August 2013
  • June 2013
  • May 2013
  • April 2013
  • March 2013
  • February 2013
  • January 2013
  • December 2012
  • October 2012
  • September 2012
  • July 2012
  • April 2012
  • March 2012
  • February 2012
  • January 2012
  • December 2011
  • November 2011
  • October 2011
  • September 2011
  • August 2011
  • July 2011
  • June 2011
  • May 2011
  • April 2011
  • February 2011
  • January 2011
  • December 2010
  • November 2010
  • September 2010
  • August 2010
  • July 2010
  • June 2010
  • May 2010
  • April 2010
  • March 2010
  • February 2010
  • January 2010
  • December 2009
  • November 2009
  • October 2009

Categories

  • Ai
  • Android
  • C#
  • CSS
  • Desktop
  • EMail
  • Faith
  • For Fun
  • Health
  • HTML
  • Javascript
  • jQuery
  • Just Info
  • Linux
  • Movies
  • MS Access
  • Music
  • Opinion
  • PHP
  • Politics
  • Powershell
  • Privacy
  • Productivity
  • Programming
  • Random Awesomeness
  • Self Hosting
  • SQL
  • SQL Server
  • Technology
  • Uncategorized
  • WordPress
©2025 benjf.com | WordPress Theme by SuperbThemes