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Researchers Accurately Predict Terrorist Attacks By Reading Brain Waves

Northwestern University researchers may have developed a way to predict terrorist activity by detect involuntary, "guilty brain waves" in brain scans.

[Researchers] divided 29 Northwestern University students into two groups. One group planned a vacation while the other group planned a terrorist attack. The students then had electrodes placed on their scalp, and were shown a series of images of various cities, such as Boston and Houston, and various means of attack, along with other related, but irrelevant, images as controls.
As the slide show advanced, the electrodes recorded the P300 waves. When, for instance, the mock terrorists saw an image of the city they planned to attack, the electrodes recorded strong P300 brain waves. The Northwestern scientist then compared the strength of all the brain waves to find out who was planning at attack on which city, when they were planning it and how they meant to carry out the attack.

They were ultimately able to detect the mock attacks with 83 percent accuracy, identifying 10 of 12 supposed terrorists.