'26/11 A Devastating Near-Miss In Spycraft History': Report Says India, US, UK Missed Warnings

NEW YORK: In one of the most glaring intelligence failures, spy agencies of the United States, Britain and India failed to join the dots gathered after their high-tech surveillance which could have averted the 26/11 Mumbai terror attacks, an investigative report said.

Pedestrians walk past a poster depicting the hanging of Pakistani-born Mohammed Ajmal Kasab, the sole surviving gunman from the 2008 Mumbai attacks outside a railway station in Mumbai. AFP/Indranil Mukherjee

A detailed report by the New York Times, ProPublica and the PBS series 'Frontline' titled In 2008 Mumbai Killings, Piles of Spy Data, but an Uncompleted Puzzle said "that hidden history of the Mumbai attacks reveals the vulnerability as well as the strengths of computer surveillance and intercepts as a counter-terrorism weapon."

"What happened next may rank among the most devastating near-misses in the history of spycraft. The intelligence agencies of the three nations did not pull together all the strands gathered by their high-tech surveillance and other tools, which might have allowed them to disrupt a terror strike so scarring that it is often called India's 9/11," said the lengthy report.

Citing classified documents leaked by Edward Snowden, the former National Security Agency contractor, it said although electronic eavesdropping often yields valuable data, even "tantalising" clues can be missed if the technology is not closely monitored, the intelligence gleaned from it is not linked with other information, or analysis does not sift incriminating activity from the ocean of digital data.

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The report said Indian and British intelligence agencies monitored online activities of Zarrar Shah, a key 26/11 planner and the technology chief of Pakistan-based Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT) terror group, "but couldn't connect the dots" before the attacks that killed 166 people, including six Americans.

In the fall of 2008, Shah "roamed from outposts in the northern mountains of Pakistan to safe houses near the Arabian Sea, plotting mayhem in Mumbai, India's commercial gem."

He was, however, unaware that by September, the British were spying on many of his online activities, tracking his internet searches and messages, the report said.

"They were not the only spies watching. Shah drew similar scrutiny from an Indian intelligence agency," it said, citing a former official briefed on the operation.

While the U.S. was unaware of the two agencies' efforts, it had picked up signs of a plot through other electronic and human sources, and warned Indian security officials several times in the months before the attack, the report said.

Routing calls through U.S.

The Pakistan-based LeT's technology chief had posed as an Indian businessman while negotiating to buy from an American company a Voice-over-Internet Phone service that was later used by the LeT handlers to communicate with 26/11 attackers while concealing their actual origin.

Shah, a 30-year-old computer expert, had set up an internet phone system to disguise his location during the 26/11 attacks by routing his calls through New Jersey.

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