BIG READ: A week in the online terror world

Michael Moynihan on his week in the online terror underworld.

IN the wake of the Boston Marathon bombings, early evidence gathered by investigators suggested that the two suspects, Tamerlan and Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, were rabid lone wolves who learned both their bomb-building craft and their murderous philosophy on the Internet.

Suddenly, pundits and experts across the political spectrum could be heard holding forth about the problem of “self-radicalisation” — the process by which those unconnected to organised jihad are lured toward extremism via the Web.