Dutch police arrest teen over threatening tweet to American Airlines

[alp227]

Source: BNO News

ROTTERDAM, THE NETHERLANDS (BNO NEWS) — A Dutch teenager was arrested in Rotterdam on Monday afternoon after she tweeted a terrorist threat at American Airlines that quickly went viral online, police officials said. It was not immediately known what charges she could face.

The tweet, sent out on Sunday afternoon, was picked up by Dutch police as part of their regular investigation into threatening messages on the social networking website Twitter. It was not on the request of American Airlines or the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) in the United States, a police spokeswoman said.

During the course of the investigation, the person behind the Twitter account was identified as a 14-year-old girl from Rotterdam, after which she went to a police station and was taken into custody for making a “false report.” It was not immediately clear if the girl would face criminal charges.

In the tweet, which quickly went viral, the girl claimed to be a member of al-Qaeda and said she would do “something really big” in June, though she quickly said it was a joke when American Airlines responded. The American airline lost two of its aircraft on September 11, 2001, when 19 al-Qaeda terrorists carried out an unprecedented attack on the United States, killing nearly 3,000 people.

Read more: http://www.bnowire.com/2014/04/14/dutch-police-arrest-teen-over-threatening-tweet-to-american-airlines/

---

other sources:

DutchNews.nl (it's in English); AP; Reuters

[PoliticAverse]

1. The US case of Justin Carter who made a joke on facebook...

http://www.cnn.com/2013/07/12/tech/social-media/facebook-jailed-teen/

[Bosonic]

2. I blocked the FBI just in case...

http://www.democraticunderground.com/11037528

[davidpdx]

3. A joke in very poor taste

Given how many flight American has and the possible delays due to something like this. I'd hope some form of punishment is forth coming.

[Art_from_Ark]

6. 14-year-olds do stupid things

Really stupid things.

[davidpdx]

7. I have to wonder if he was using the standard "I was bored defense"

[Art_from_Ark]

9. She-- it was a girl

I did lots of stupid things at 14, and not because I was bored, but because that's just how kids can be at that age. I would never have thought about making an actual threat to an airline company, but I wonder what kinds of really stupid things I might have been tempted to do as a joke if I had had the same kind of exposure to "tweets" and other kinds of virtual reality that today's kids have.

[davidpdx]

10. Well we did have telephones

Prank calling was possible when we were that age. Then there is toilet papering trees. That one I'll plead no contest to.

[Historic NY]

4. Well with all the taunting tweets, she was acting like a twit...

AA even warned here.

[Blue_Tires]

17. I'm amused that she thought her whiteness would

all of a sudden get her out of hot water...

[Bosonic]

5. Dozens of teenagers are now tweeting bomb jokes to American Airlines

Dozens of teenagers are now tweeting bomb jokes to American Airlines

One dumb teenager is easily excused — but the host of Twitter users currently tweeting bomb threats at major airlines is another story entirely.

In case you’ve somehow missed this latest round of Internet idiocy, here’s what went down: Sunday night, a Dutch teenager identified only as “Sarah” infamously tweeted a threat at American Airlines. (“hello my name’s Ibrahim and I’m from Afghanistan. I’m part of Al Qaida and on June 1st I’m gonna do something really big bye,” she wrote. Hilarious!) She then promptly made the account private and insisted it was all a joke — “I’m so stupid, I’m scared,” she wrote at one point — but not before American reported her name and IP address to authorities, leading to her arrest in Rotterdam on Monday.

You’d think that would warn off other pranksters, but the opposite has actually been true. In fact, at least a dozen other people have threatened American or, oddly, Southwest, an unrelated airline, under the guise of a “prank” or “joke.”

http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/style-blog/wp/2014/04/14/dozens-of-teenagers-are-now-tweeting-bomb-jokes-to-american-airlines/?Post+generic=%3Ftid%3Dsm_twitter_washingtonpost

[davidpdx]

11. One person does it and suddenly everyone else thinks they have to do the same exact thing

It's bad enough that the one threatening tweet was posted.

[Nihil]

8. More pointless paranoia from the bullies ...

Bet they only moved when they realised the source was a 14-year-old girl
(i.e., after she replied to the "we're going to tell the FBI" from American Airlines.)




> “Hello my name’s Ibrahim and I’m from Afghanistan. I’m part of Al Qaida and
> on June 1st I’m gonna do something really big bye,”

So threatening ... especially the way she signed off with "Bye" ...

How can *anyone* get prosecuted for making a "false report" on Twitter FFS?
The entire network owes its existence to false reports, snarky crap and random bullshit
yet some gutless little-dick decides to come on hard to a teenage girl over this?

[davidpdx]

12. Any threat should be taken seriously

Ever traveled to the Philippines? There is a sign in the airport that says "don't even joke about bringing a bomb on the plane, you will be arrested". I happened to see the sign and made a little chitchat with the guard and asked him about the sign. He told me that some famous Filipino star made a joke in the airport and that's why they had to put the signs up to make it very clear that they don't find it funny or acceptable.

I don't care if the girl was 14 or 41, if she was from The Netherlands or the US. American Airlines had the right to report it as a threat. Considering they lost two planes in a terrorist attack, I don't blame them at all.

This isn't the picture I took, but I Googled it and found the same sign:

[Nihil]

13. "Any threat"? A sense of perspective would help.

A post on Twitter saying

>> “Hello my name’s Ibrahim and I’m from Afghanistan. I’m part of Al Qaida and
>> on June 1st I’m gonna do something really big bye”

is a world of difference from talking about "carrying bombs whilst in the airport".

If she'd claimed she was going to (or had) put a bomb on board a particular flight
or that she planned to put a bomb in a market place or whatever then you'd have
a point (and I probably wouldn't have responded in the first place).

A random tweet about "I’m gonna do something really big bye" isn't a "threat".

What's next? Someone getting arrested because she said she would "blow you"?

[davidpdx]

14. Had American Airlines done nothing and it had been a real threat what do you think would

have happened? Freedom of speech only goes so far.

The Dutch won't do anything to her anyway. She probably got a good talking to from the police and her parents and a slap on the hand.

If you look at the TOS on Twitter (or any other service) it pretty much says plainly you are responsible for what you post. By using the service you are agreeing to the TOS whether you know what it says or not.

In terms of technology, teens have access to quite a bit of it these days (computers weren't something that were a household item yet when I was growing up in the 80's). Parents should be responsible for monitoring their kids use of the internet.

[LibertyLover]

16. US Airports have zero tolerance for those types of jokes too

Several years ago, just before 9/11 as a matter of fact, one of my cousins and his wife were in the Virginia Beach Airport about to get on a plane for Seattle and a family reunion. There were a lot of people waiting to go through the scanners and his wife made some sort of joke about all the people a bomb explosion would take out. It was overheard by a security guard and they were summarily pulled out of line, taken to a back office and "talked to". They missed their flight of course, were told that they were banned from the airport for some length of time (I don't recall if it was a week or a month - not long, just annoying) and had to rebook via another airport in the area for their flight. She said later at the reunion that she had learned her lesson and would not speak again while standing in line at an airport.

[TuxedoKat]

19. Years ago

when I worked for various airlines at ticket counters some people would make jokes about having guns in their bags, etc., in advance of having to go through security. I would literally BEG and tell people very sternly not to do that when they got down to the security checkpoint because they took it seriously and they might not get on the plane. Some people still ignored the warning and didn't make their planes though.

[davidpdx]

20. Thanks for sharing that

It is interesting hearing the experience of someone who worked for an airline.

[tavernier]

15. I recently flew AA to Europe

I was tempted to tweet "your airline sux!!"
I wisely chose to lodge my complaints to my tour group. Timing is everything. 😄

[penultimate]

18. You probably would have been fine if you stuck with that

Now, if you said "Your airline blows.....up LOLOLOL" that might have got them riled up.