The Ghost in the Machines: The Mystery of the WTC Hard Drive Recoveries

by Michael Fury

Many are aware of the surge in put options purchased on American and United Airlines as well as several major tenants of the WTC in the days preceding 9/11, purchases the 9/11 Commission Report waves away in a footnote on pg. 499 as “having no connection with 9/11", explaining that a “single U.S.-based institutional investor with no conceivable ties to al Qaeda purchased 95 percent of the UAL puts on September 6." This investor has not been identified. Nonetheless, as a National Review contributor put it on 7/26/04, “on September 10, 2001, somebody, somewhere, was very, very bearish about AMR's near-term prospects.” “And for executing options orders of the magnitude of early September, one would require the services of a major institutional broker — you try inputting "Buy 4,500 AMR October Puts" on E*Trade without getting a quizzical call from the broker. That kind of access would have been far beyond the means of anyone who could possibly have known in advance of the attacks.” (Curiously, despite the Commission’s dismissal of 9/11 insider trading, this “myth” informs the premise of the recent James Bond film Casino Royale.)

More obscure, and nowhere mentioned in the Commission Report, are the facts of the WTC computer data recovery operation undertaken in late 2001 by Convar GmbH, a German firm. Under conditions of hermetic secrecy, Convar used its proprietary technology to salvage data from the damaged hard drives of WTC tenants, as reported in December 2001 by Reuters and CNN.

http://www.rediff.com/money/2001/dec/17wtc.htm

http://archives.cnn.com/2001/TECH/industry/12/20/wtc.harddrives.idg/

From the Reuters article:

“Were criminals responsible for the sharp rise in credit card transactions that moved through some computer systems at the WTC shortly before the planes hit the twin towers?

Or was it coincidence that unusually large sums of money, perhaps more than $100 million, were rushed through the computers as the disaster unfolded?”

"The suspicion is that inside information about the attack was used to send financial transaction commands and authorisations in the belief that amid all the chaos the criminals would have, at the very least, a good head start," said Convar director Peter Henschel.”

"It could turn out that Americans went on an absolute shopping binge on that Tuesday morning. But at this point there are many transactions that cannot be accounted for," Henschel said.

"Not only the volume but the size of the transactions was far higher than usual for a day like that. There is a suspicion that these were possibly planned to take advantage of the chaos."

“Richard Wagner, a data retrieval expert at the company, said illegal transfers of more than $100 million might have been made immediately before and during the disaster.”

"There is a suspicion that some people had advance knowledge of the approximate time of the plane crashes in order to move out amounts exceeding $100 million," Wagner said. "They thought that the records of their transactions could not be traced after the main frames were destroyed."

“Henschel said the companies in the United States were working together with the FBI to piece together what happened on September 11 and that he was confident the destination of the dubious transactions would one day be tracked down.”

After the CNN article of December 20, the media was stricken mute on the Convar investigation. Of the media blackouts shrouding 9/11, none has been more absolute.

Notice that Convar, its unnamed WTC clients and the FBI possessed this data, and that the FBI would have no reason to withhold it had it proven benign or consistent with the Commission’s account of the attacks.

Of interest also is the acquisition trail of Convar subsequent to its data recovery operation. In June 2002 Convar was acquired by Kroll Inc., a powerful international “security” firm which has earned a reputation as “the CIA of Wall Street” because of the many former intelligence officers (CIA, FBI, MI6, Scotland Yard etc.) on its payroll. Kroll Managing Director Jerome Hauer was instrumental in the design of Giuliani’s Office of Emergency Management command-and-control bunker on the 23rd floor of WTC 7, and in August 2001 arranged the hiring of former FBI counter-terrorism chief John O’Neill to head WTC security (O’Neill was killed in the attacks, on what Bernard Kerik claimed was his “first or second day on the job” http://edition.cnn.com/2001/US/09/21/vic.body.terror.expert/).
More recently, Kroll has itself been acquired by Marsh & McLennan, which on 9/11 occupied floors 94 through 100 of WTC 1, the target area of the impact.

It is worth remembering what Sibel Edmonds told Jim Hogue: “I can tell you that the issue, on one side, boils down to money--a lot of money. And it boils down to people and their connections with this money…”

http://baltimorechronicle.com/050704SibelEdmonds.shtml

Consider again Wagner’s speculation: “They thought that the records of their transactions could not be traced after the main frames were destroyed." The locations of the computers in question within the towers is unknown, but if Wagner is correct, two possibilities emerge: (1) either the “insiders” had foreknowledge of the precise impact points of the aircraft (otherwise why assume that the main frames would be destroyed?) or (2) they had foreknowledge of the total destruction of the towers. Upon reflection, for numerous reasons the first possibility recedes into remote improbability. But why would the “insiders” assume the total collapse of the towers when there was no historical precedent for such an event and the towers had been designed to survive the impact of fuel-laden 707s at 600 mph? http://911research.wtc7.net/wtc/analysis/design.html If in fact the WTC towers were demolished by explosives, incendiaries or other means, whoever initiated these transactions should be considered suspect for complicity in those acts.

No legitimate reason--in fact no reason whatsoever--for withholding the Convar data has to date been offered.