FBI Says Islamic State Used eBay, PayPal To Channel Money To the US (theverge.com)

An anonymous reader quotes a report from The Verge: Islamic State allegedly used PayPal and fake eBay transactions to channel money to an operative in the U.S., The Wall Street Journal reports. The man who allegedly received the money was American citizen Mohamed Elshinawy, who was arrested last year in Maryland. The FBI claims that Elshinawy, in his early 30s, sold computer printers on eBay as a front in order to receive the payments through PayPal. The details have come to light because of a recently unsealed FBI affidavit, which alleges Elshinawy was part of a worldwide network that used such channels to fund ISIS. Elshinawy received $8,700 from ISIS, including five PayPal payments from senior ISIS official Siful Sujan through his technology company. Those funds were used to buy a laptop, a cellphone, and a VPN to communicate with IS, according to the affidavit. Sujan was killed in a drone strike in 2015. eBay told The Wall Street Journal it "has zero tolerance for criminal activities taking place on our marketplace." Meanwhile, a spokeswoman for PayPal said it "invests significant time and resources in working to prevent terrorist activity on our platform. We proactively report suspicious activities and respond quickly to lawful requests to support law enforcement agencies in their investigations."

Comments

Wow

[Anonymous Coward]

PayPal gives you enough of a hard time getting your money when your legit.... They freeze funds at will and seemingly at random based on smallest complaint or suspicion... But activity like this gets by???

Re:Wow

[ShanghaiBill]

But activity like this gets by???

Uhh, it was $8700 over several months. The guy could have made more money if he just got a job at McDonalds. Maybe ISIS's "vast worldwide network" isn't such a big threat after all.

The evidence?

[nanoflower]

I hope the FBI has more evidence than the summary or the article has. All that they state is that he sold a cellphone, laptop and a VPN service to a company. That company happened to be owned by a guy associate with ISIS.

Then they make the leap that the money paid was going to be used to plan an attack in the US. All of which may be true but unless they have the guy on record as planning an attack or captured his plans it's going to be hard to prove that case. So either the FBI has a weak case or this is a really weak article.

His crime was selling stuff?

[jandrese]

So they funded him by buying goods and services with money? Motherfucker, that's a JOB!