When two Egyptian students, Ahmed Mohamed and Yousef Megahed, were indicted last August on terrorism charges, federal prosecutors revealed that Mohamed had produced a 12-minute, Arabic-language video illustrating how to make a bomb using a "remote control device for toys" as the detonator.

Yesterday, the Transportation Security Administration (TSA) announced that it's upping scrutiny on airline passengers who…travel with remote control toys. The TSA is often accused of being behind the curve on terrorist thinking. So this time, TSA Chief Kip Hawley acknowledged the link in interviews, but counseled that the Ahmed Mohamed video was "just one piece of intelligence that led to the change."

Reporter Eric Lipton points out a ten-month-old piece of public domain in yesterday's International Herald Tribune: after discovering that the terrorist organization the Tamil Tigers was using remote control toys in roadside bombs, the government of Sri Lanka banned their import. From Arab News last January:

Sri Lanka Customs Impose New Ban   

Mohammed Rasooldeen, Arab News   

COLOMBO, 9 January 2007 — In view of the current security situation, Sri Lanka has imposed a ban on the import of remote control toys to the island, a senior official of the Sri Lankan Customs told Arab News yesterday. “Sri Lankan expatriates living abroad and foreign visitors will not be allowed to bring in remote control toy helicopters and airplanes through the Colombo International Airport,” the custom official said, pointing out that some of these toys are being used by terrorists in claymore mine attacks against the government soldiers and civilians.

 

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