The FBI declined to confirm details of the program or why it was put on hold or when it is expected to go live. After initially declining to comment altogether, the agency on Sunday night issued a statement. The FBI's J. Edgar Hoover building in Washington, DC. Credit:Bloomberg "The FBI is developing a website designed to provide awareness about the dangers of violent extremist predators on the internet, with input from students, educators and community leaders," the statement read. The community groups said they learned about the site last month when the FBI called several people to a meeting. Also at the meeting, the FBI described its plan for "Shared Responsibility Committees", which the Muslim and Arab participants said are proposed groups of community leaders and FBI representatives who could discuss cases of specific youths. The participants said they were also very concerned about the concept and complained to the Department of Justice. That program was put on hold last week, participants said.

The US government and local law enforcement have struggled to find ways to reach young Americans who may be attracted to violent Islamist extremism before they break the law. In addition to the FBI and the Department of Homeland Security, the Justice Department has recently set up pilot programs in Los Angeles, Minneapolis and Boston. Then prime minister Tony Abbott meets with the joint FBI-New York Police Department Joint Terrorism Task Force during a visit to New York in September 2014. Credit:Alex Ellinghausen However, as the community groups noted, experts disagree on what might be clear triggers for young people, similarly to the cases of dozens of non-Muslims who have perpetrated the US epidemic of mass shootings. "We were all on the same page in terms of being concerned," said Hoda Hawa, director of policy and advocacy for MPAC. "It seems like they're asking teachers to be extensions of law enforcement and to police thought, and students as well. That was very concerning to us all." Nineteen-year-old Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, left, with his brother Tamerlan at the Boston Marathon finish line on April 15, 2013. The FBI has struggled to identify triggers for radicalisation. Credit:FBI

Seamus Hughes, the deputy director of George Washington University's program on extremism, said he hadn't seen the FBI program. However, he said, work in schools could be complicated. "Unfortunately, the age of violent extremists is trending younger and younger. Therefore, schools can be an important space in spotting and combating radicalisation, as teachers are often best positioned to see concerning signs. Anwar al-Awlaki, an American-born Islamist whose online English-language magazine Inspire was at the forefront of radicalisation. Credit:AP "Of course this needs to be done right, with proper training, respect of civil liberties and without stigmatising," Mr Hughes said. "Doing otherwise would make the effort counter-productive. There are finite resources for countering violent extremism programming. It may be best to focus efforts elsewhere." Details about the website were vague. However, some participants described what the FBI showed them at the October meeting.

Faisal Shahzad, a Pakistani-American sentenced to life in jail for the attempted Times Square bombing of May 2010. Credit:Orkut.com/AP It included exercises like a quiz, which asked students: What would be activities that would concern the FBI? One option asked about a youth posting on Facebook that she intended to attend a political protest. What about a young person posting about feeling emotional about something, was a second. The third, participants described, cited a youth with a stereotypically Muslim-sounding name who "posted that he's going overseas on a mission [and] does anyone want to chat?" Ms Hawa said. "All our hands went up, like: What's with this?" she said of the meeting. Among those at the meeting were representatives of MPAC, the ADC, the Universal Muslim Association of America (UMAA), Karamah (a group of Muslim female lawyers focusing on global human rights) and groups representing Yemeni-Americans and Sikh-Americans, said Abed Ayoub, legal and policy director of the ADC. Mr Ayoub, who attended the meeting, said participants asked how schools would come to learn of the site. The FBI said it would reach out to schools to see if they were interested and was aiming for it to be used in civics, social studies and government classes. They had already showed the site to some "teachers and students in northern Virginia to get feedback", Mr Ayoub said.

"They said they had received commitments from school districts," he said, and expected some 400,000 youths to use the site when it rolls out. It wasn't clear which northern Virginia schools, if any, might have been involved in trying out the site and the FBI did not respond to a request to clarify that point. "The one that should be involved is the Department of Education. The FBI is overreaching its mission," Mr Ayoub said. "This kind of thing should come from professionals who create educational curriculum. You don't just have a law enforcement agency get it out to students without thinking about the ramifications on students in schools." While group participants and experts said they believed this would be the first such program in schools, law enforcement agencies have for a decade been debating and creating efforts called counter-radicalisation or countering violent extremism, or CVE. Some Muslim leaders are sceptical of efforts they see as disproportionately focused on Muslims and wrongly leaning on Muslims to connect law enforcement to people who may simply be criticising US foreign policy or have mental health issues, among other scenarios.

'There is no consensus' "The most controversial part of CVE is that there is no consensus as to what is a pre-terrorism indicator," said Faiza Patel, co-director of the Liberty and National Security Program at the Brennan Center for Justice at New York University's law school. Efforts a decade ago were "crude", Ms Patel said, and focused on things like whether someone was becoming more religious, growing a beard or changing their pattern in mosque attendance. "It's evolved a bit, but if you say signs of radicalisation are alienation and disaffection - that can apply to many, many people," said Ms Patel, who had not seen the FBI website. "I have teenagers, they are alienated and disaffected a good amount of the time." Ms Patel said this was the first she'd heard of such a program meant for use in schools.

"There is concern this will lead to a high level of self-policing and shut off open debate. If concern about US foreign policy and its impact is considered a sign of alienation, or call it what you will, people will stop talking about that, and that's counter-productive, because you want safe spaces, rather than pushing kids online," she said. Committees cause for concern Mr Ayoub said the concept of the Shared Responsibility Committees took up more of the hours-long meeting and was more disturbing to him. Some Muslims have since September 11, 2001, expressed concern about government informants in mosques, and the committees seemed like an effort to institutionalise an informant system. When the FBI opens a case into someone, Mr Ayoub said, it would bring the name to the committee, which would review it, meet with the youth and perhaps someone in mental health or a mentor, and then report back to the FBI. "What if committee members aren't properly trained or have an agenda? There were no uniform rules, so each committee could have its own ideas. It's very problematic," Mr Ayoub said. "What if the issue is one of mental health? We don't believe the FBI has a role in this type of work. The FBI should be about protecting the community."

Mr Ayoub said some of the meeting participants complained to the US attorney-general about both the website and the Shared Responsibility Committees. On Thursday, the Justice Department told the Muslim and Arab groups that the committees were suspended for now. The Justice Department did not respond to a request for comment. Washington Post