Al-Qaeda Using Fallout 3 to Plan Terror Attacks? Unlikely!

The Evening Standard, a London-based newspaper, reported a story this morning of new terror scares sparked by an image posted to Islamic extremists’ websites. The image, described by the paper as “computer-generated,” depicts an apocalyptic scene of our nation’s capital in ruin after a theoretical nuclear attack.

In reality, the image is actually a piece of concept art that was distributed by Bethesda Softworks over a year ago to promote Fallout 3, the post-apocalyptic RPG slated for release later this year.

The SITE Intelligence Group, an internet watchdog group that monitors Islamic militant websites, originally reported the image to the FBI when they saw it appear on two password-protected websites they believed to be linked to affliated with al-Qa’eda.

Since then, news outlets including the Evening Standard and Drudge Report have reported on the story, linking to the game art. Well done.