Homeland Security News

The Paris prosecutor’s anti-terror unit has taken on the investigation into a deadly knife attack on police headquarters, a source at the prosecutor’s office told Reuters on Friday.

On Thursday, a 45-year-old IT assistant at the police headquarters in central Paris went on a knife rampage inside the building, killing three police officers and an administrative worker before he was shot dead by an officer. French media have said the attacker had converted to Islam 18 months ago, but this has not been confirmed by authorities.

Read more: Reuters

The United States, the United Kingdom and Australia have called on Facebook Inc to not go ahead with end-to-end encryption across its messaging services unless law enforcement officials have backdoor access, saying encryption hindered the fight against child abuse and terrorism.

The United States and United Kingdom also signed a special data agreement that would fast track requests from law enforcement to technology companies for information about the communications of terrorists and child predators.

Law enforcement could get information in weeks or even days instead of the current wait of six months to two years.

Read more: Reuters

An Arizona man facing a terrorism charge has been released from jail as he awaits trial.

A Maricopa County Superior Court judge on Thursday ordered 18-year-old Ismail Hamad of Fountain Hills be placed on house arrest and get an electronic monitor until his trial starts next year.

The trial had been scheduled to begin later this month, but has been pushed back until May 14, 2020.

Hamad was indicted on two charges of terrorism for allegedly providing assistance to the Islamic State and engaging in an act of terrorism.

Read more: KGUN

Between mid-July and mid-September, Spanish police monitoring travel across the Strait of Gibraltar detected 46 individuals suspected of being returning jihadists, according to a European Commission report. Part of a border control effort dubbed Operation Minerva, the 46 anti-jihadist alerts did not result in any arrests as there were no existing warrants against the suspects.

As part of Operation Minerva, officers from the National Police and Civil Guard were deployed at Spain’s busy seaports of Algeciras, Tarifa and Ceuta, a Spanish exclave city located on the northern coast of Africa. Law enforcement experts from 16 other EU states and observers from the United States were also present.

Read more: El Pais (Spain)

A former Oklahoma resident has been sentenced after he was convicted of concealing attendance at a terrorist training camp and visa fraud, the U.S. Attorney's Office of the Western District of Oklahoma reported.

Former Weatherford, Oklahoma, resident Naif Abdulaziz M. Alfallaj, 35, was sentenced to 151 months (12 years and seven months) in federal prison for making a false statement to the FBI about his attendance at an al Qaeda training camp in Afghanistan in late 2000 and visa fraud.

Read more: News 9