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Social media has given terrorist groups such as the Islamic State (IS) the ability to recruit Americans and others like never before, and the threat of Americans and others returning to their home countries from Syria to carry out terrorist attacks has become the chief issue of concern, U.S. Homeland Security Secretary Jeh Johnson said Wednesday.
"There is a capability to recruit people and inspire them by a terrorist organization without them ever having to go to a terrorist camp or to get an order directly from somebody in command in a terrorist organization right here at home," Johnson told the Air Force Association's Air and Space Conference in Maryland.
IS is very adept at using social media to spread propaganda and boost recruitment, he added.
Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel has said that at least 100 Americans are among the foreigners who have joined rebels in Syria since the start of the country's civil war.
"We're concerned that these individuals may hook up with extremists and become indoctrinated by their ideology and return to their home countries motivated to commit terrorist acts," Johnson said, citing the Boston Marathon bombing last year as example of the kind of threat the nation needs to remain focused on.
The ability of Americans and others who do not require a visa to enter to the United States has led the Department of Homeland Security to review how easy it is for those travelers to clear immigration. "We are right now reviewing what additional information we should obtain from visa waiver countries," Johnson said, adding that IS is by all accounts "a dangerous terrorist organization".
The U.S. Home Security Department is "very focused" on the threat posed by IS, Johnson said, but the intelligence community currently has no specific credible information that IS is planning an attack on the homeland.
