The FBI thwarted potential terrorist attacks planned around the Fourth of July by arresting more than 10 people inspired by ISIS in the four to six weeks leading up to the holiday, said FBI director James Comey on Thursday, according to Reuters.
"I do believe that our work disrupted efforts to kill people, likely in connection with July 4," Comey said at the quarterly briefing session with reporters.
Comey said that the arrests drew attention to Islamic State's ability to radicalize people using the Internet and carry out terrorist attacks in the United States, according to the LA Times.
The FBI head did not identify the people or provide details about the terror plots but confirmed that the agency had launched a broad campaign to disrupt ISIS-sympathizers in the month before July 4.
He said the suspects were inspired and directed by an Islamic State-owned social media campaign, which has 21,000 English-language followers - many inside the United States - according to ABC News.
"What we're seeing now is living proof that social media works. It's the reason that Twitter is worth billions of dollars. It's an extraordinarily effective way to sell shoes, or vacation, or terrorism," said Comey. He also added that some of the plotters had switched to encrypted communication, making it more difficult to track them.
About a week before the holiday, the FBI and the Department of Homeland Security issued a bulletin to law enforcement agencies across the country warning them of the potential Islamic State-inspired terror attacks targeting the police and the military, as HNGN previously reported.
The warning gave authorities plenty of time to make arrests before any terrorist attacks could be executed, he said. Comey gave the example of the 26-year-old Boston terror suspect Usaama Rahim who was fatally shot by police last month after he tried to attack them using a military-style knife. Rahim was under surveillance by five FBI agents and one police officer, all part of a Joint Terrorism Task Force.
