Review to FBI: Room for improvement on fighting terror
WASHINGTON -- The FBI should speed up the pace of its improvements to deal with the evolving terrorist threat around the world and improve its intelligence-collection capabilities, according to an outside review released Wednesday.
The report found that the FBI had made significant improvements since the Sept. 11 terror attacks but that there was room for improvement, especially at a time of emerging threats such as the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria, or ISIS, and foreign fighters in Syria.
"The threats are not just knocking on the door. They're in the room," said former Rep. Timothy Roemer.
The report also says the FBI needs to improve its analysis and collection of intelligence, and that Congress should provide the bureau with "the authorities and state-of-the-art tools" it needs to fight terrorism.
It says that while the FBI now does a better job in sharing information with other law enforcement agencies, there's still room for improvement.
CBS News correspondent Jeff Pegues reports that the review says the FBI has to confront "growing and increasingly complex national security threats, including from adaptive and increasingly tech-savy terrorists, more brazen computer hackers, and more technically capable, global cybersyndicates."
The report was released Wednesday by FBI Director James Comey and members of the 9/11 Review Commission. That group was established last year to measure how well the FBI had followed an earlier set of recommendations in the aftermath of the Sept. 11 terror attacks.
The report examined five terror plots and attacks in the last few years, including the 2009 Fort Hood shooting and the 2013 Boston Marathon bombing. It also took a fresh look at the Sept. 11 terror attacks, but found no new evidence to change its conclusions about who was responsible.