July 11, 2004

A mysterious internet service provider with apparent ties to al Qaeda continues to operate as a virtual mouthpiece for the terrorist organization by using an elaborate web of deception.

The latest site to appear on the Hosting Anime servers is www.hostinganime.com/sout19.

According to Middle East Online (www.middle-east-online.com/english/saudi/?id=10546), the site contains a message from Fares al-Zahrani, one of the most sought after terror suspects in Saudi Arabia.

In a message contained on the site, Zahrani rejected an offer to turn himself in.

"I never contemplated surrendering to any tyrant," Zahrani said in the message (whose authenticity could not be independently verified) attributed to him on www.hostinganime.com/sout19/index.htm.

Zahrani also denied he had initiated contacts with a Saudi cleric, Sheikh Safar al-Hawali, with a view to surrendering.

"This is a lie," he said, according to Middle East Online, calling the Saudi regime "an infidel and despotic state against which jihad (holy war) should be waged." Zahrani is on a list of 26 top terror suspects which has been cut down to 13 since it was issued by Saudi authorities last December, Middle East Online reported. Half of the militants on the list have either been killed in clashes with security forces or surrendered to authorities.

In addition to hosting messages from terrorists, Hosting Anime sites have been used to provide gruesome pictures of the beheadings of engineer Paul Johnson and South Korean translator Kim Sun-Il. Despite this, a special agent in the Phoenix FBI office said his agency's investigations have led him to conclude that Hosting Anime site operators are not involved in the murders in any way and that the agency is looking toward the Middle East.

When asked by a reporter why the owners of Hosting Anime are repeatedly going out of their way to provide a cluttered trail of false contact information, the agent refused to answer. He told a reporter that he really couldn't say anything other than that the reporter was going down the wrong trail by looking for additional information about the web site operators.

The agent added ominously, "You could end up helping people you don't want to help. You may already have." The agent refused to clarify what he meant by the statement.

The contact information given for Hosting Anime ranges from a mail drop box in Westchester California, to the telephone number for an apartment complex in Seattle, to another address and telephone number in Seattle. When a woman in Seattle whose number was listed as a contact for the site was called, she initially denied knowing anything about the situation. However, after talking to her, a reporter was initially contacted by an individual claiming to be her son. Speaking on condition of anonymity the individual said he was concerned that his teenage son, who had been in trouble before, may have somehow gotten mixed up with Hosting Anime. When that concern was expressed to the FBI, the same agent told a reporter that the father wasn't concerned at all. The agent refused to elaborate and a call to the individual who made the statement was not immediately returned.

Additional research on Hosting Anime (registered to "Mike Smith" of www.darkfiles.net) has revealed even more confusion on just who is behind the company. Hosting Anime tells its web site owners that the company is a partner with www.mysmallurl.com.

Hosting Anime writes, "They provide small URL's ... They currently have four domains to choose from."

One of those domains is www.vzeu.com. While www.mysmallurl.com registers to "Mike Smith" purportedly from Seattle and using a false address and telephone number, checking on the registration information for www.vzeu.com takes readers back to www.mysmallurl.com, this time with different registration information. This time the contact is given as "ChooChoo,"Matt Kewlies, 2412 Super Court, Yahooville, California 22401.

As Internet terror researcher Johnathan Galt pointed out in a recent e-mail, there is no 324 area code; there is no Yahooville California, and the zip code given is for Virginia.

An e-mail to Kewlies requesting comment was not immediately answered.

However, Galt said that Kewlies did leave some clues from his e mails (www.staindsouls.com/gbook/index.php?page=2,
http://members.lycos.co.uk/dewcurtain/gbook/index.php).

According to Galt, "(Kewlies') e-mail appears as the first post of a software used for posting comments on websites. ‘You have successfully installed fusion gbook!' I suspect he may be the programmer."

Galt added, "(Kewlies) AIM handle, amazing2eyedman, also gives a few hits. He was selling his domain http://www.myfreebb.com/ (in Feb. 2004) and has this email, webmaster@myfreebb.com. He gave his real name as ‘Matt A.'"

An e-mail by a reporter to webmaster@myfreebb.com was returned as undeliverable. Also registered to Kewlies is www.animanga.vzeu.com and www.sean.vzeu.com. "Sean's Page," which provides a link to Britain's Liverpool Daily Post and the Liverpool football team web site, gives a non working e-mail address for Sean (annfinnan@eircom.net). It also provides a link to a page hosted by Hosting Anime (www.hostinganime.com/david/donate.html) where readers are invited to send money to "Sean." The name and address provided for sending donations to "Sean" is David Bannon, Meeltenagh, Edgeworthstown, County Longford, Ireland.

Hosting Anime's "Mike Smith" also hosts a number of other sites that include www.Anime200.com, www.BadAssgamers.com, and www.Giguphosting.com.

Jeremy Reynalds

He was honored with the prestigious Jefferson Award in 1994. Reynalds emigrated from England to the United States in 1978 and became a naturalized American citizen in 1999. He has a master's degree in communication from the University of New Mexico and is a candidate for the Ph.D. in intercultural education at Biola University, located in La Mirada, California, just outside Los Angeles.

He is also the author of two books and a contributor to a third, which deals with the media's images of the homeless. He may be reached by e-mail at jeremy@joyjunction.org.