The small number of amateur cyber-jockeys who seek to harm the US use poor encryption and are barely capable of writing unsophisticated malware; these extremists pose practically no online threat to US National Security, according to Meg King, a Director of the Digital Futures Project at the Wilson Center and Grayson Clary, a Research Associate with the Digital Futures Project.
In late August 2015, Junaid Hussain, a "British national considered the Islamic State's most capable hacker — though that may not have been a high bar to clear," King wrote, was killed in a targeted airstrike by the US.
Sujan was labeled a "top hacker" by Hussain, and the capabilities of both men were often overstated in the media. While Hussain enjoyed some notoriety for a string of nuisance attacks, none of his efforts amounted to real damage, as his tools and scripts were easily identified and neutralized.
The current US military strategy of targeted killing campaigns arguably seeks to make individual militants more important than they actually are. Dead, Sujan and Hussein carry more weight as a symbol of martyrdom, and their deaths can easily be manipulated to prompt more recruits.
