Federal law enforcement agencies are tracking almost 800 cases related to ISIS inside the US, according to FBI Director James Comey.
He told reporters Wednesday that there are currently about 1,000 cases open into potentially radicalized individuals living in the U.S. Out of these cases, roughly 80 percent of them are related to the Islamic State.
Despite that high number, Comey said that ISIS’ power in the U.S. is dwindling, as fewer Americans are traveling overseas to fight with the terror group.
“The so-called Islamic State brand has lost significant power in the United States,” Comey said. “They’ve lost their ability to attract people to their Caliphate from the United States.”
He revealed that the FBI encountered between six and ten Americans a month in 2014 and the first half of 2015 who traveled to the Middle East or tried to go there to join ISIS.
He said that number has dwindled down to one per month since last summer and is continuing a downward trend.
Comey did acknowledge that ISIS’ “ability to motivate troubled souls, to inspire them” remains a problem in the U.S.
He said that their online propaganda remains a threat, since it targets people from all over the globe.
He added that encrypted messaging apps like Facebook’s WhatsApp and Telegram have hindered some of their efforts to catch radicalized individuals, calling the technology a “huge feature of terrorist tradecraft.”
foxnews.com
