Remembering 9/11: FBI Has Evolved in Response to Changing Threats | WPN World People News

This weekend, the FBI joins the nation in remembering and honoring the victims of the 9/11 terror attacks, which occurred 15 years ago this month.

It was then that the Bureau began the most massive investigation in its history, after terrorists hijacked and crashed four commercial airliners—two at the World Trade Center in New York, one at the Pentagon, and one in a field in Shanksville, Pennsylvania—killing 33 crew members, 213 passengers, and 2,730 people on the ground. Thousands more were injured.

Since the attacks of 9/11, the FBI has transformed from a reactive, investigative-led model to a proactive, intelligence-driven one where intelligence informs our investigative strategies, enhances our understanding of terrorism threats, and increases our ability to address and mitigate these threats. The terrorism threats against the U.S. have evolved since 2001, but they remain, according to Director James Comey, “persistent and acute,” especially those posed by individuals who are recruited domestically and travel abroad to join the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL), and by homegrown violent extremists who may aspire to attack the United States from within.

In response to these evolving threats, the FBI uses all lawful investigative techniques and methods at its disposal. With our domestic and foreign partners, the Bureau collects and analyzes intelligence information as it pertains to foreign terrorist organizations and homegrown violent extremists. We also encourage information sharing, working closely with the many federal, state, local, and tribal agencies assigned to our Joint Terrorism Task Forces around the country.

“Rest assured,” said Comey, speaking before a congressional committee earlier this year, “the FBI continues to strive to work and share information more efficiently and to pursue technological and other methods to help stay ahead of threats to the homeland.”

The Bureau also strives, on a daily basis, to ensure the safety of the American public from the threat of terrorism and other crimes while safeguarding citizens’ constitutional rights.

source: U.S. Federal Bureau of Investigation