Probably not a good idea to take a selfie if you’re doing something nasty
There are many, many times where taking a selfie is inappropriate – inside a theater (while the movie is playing), during an emergency and while you’re doing something illegal. Turns out, ISIS doesn’t have a no-selfie rule in place inside sensitive areas like their headquarters, which allowed planes from the US Airforce to find them and bomb them into oblivion.
Gen. Hawk Carlisle, the commander of the US Air Force’s Combat Command shared how the insurgent’s lack of social media awareness cost them their base, and ultimately their lives: “The guys that were working down out of Hurlburt, they’re combing through social media and they see some moron standing at this command. And in some social media, open forum, bragging about the command and control capabilities for Daesh, ISIL,” Carlisle said.
“And these guys go: ‘We got an in.’ So they do some work, long story short, about 22 hours later through that very building, three JDAMs (Joint Direct Attack Munitions) take that entire building out.”
While Carlisle did not share exactly how they extrapolated the location of the building from the selfie, it’s likely the insurgent’s photo had geo-location data in it which is included in many photos by default.
ISIS usually take to social media to recruit and share their exploits, but, in this case, an errant selfie spelled the doom of the building’s occupants.
