A judge overseeing the trial of three alleged Muslim “cyber-terrorists” has been given a basic lesson in the internet – after admitting that he did not know what a “website” was.

Mr Justice Peter Openshaw, who is conducting the trial at Woolwich Crown Court, stunned prosecutors when he said: “The trouble is I don’t understand the language. I don’t really understand what a website is.”

His remark looks destined to join a list of comments by judges that are forever trotted out in support of the legend of judicial ignorance.

Yesterday, the judge paid close attention to a Powerpoint presentation on the world-wide web. The first slide displayed by Professor Tony Sams, a computer expert, showed a yellow cloud labelled “internet” connected by blue lines to two computers.

Professor Sams told the judge: “The internet is a complex communication system. What you need to do is log into the system either through a telephone cable or perhaps through a television cable.”

The professor then explained the terms “dial-up” and “broad-band”, adding: “It is how fast you can communicate.”

He said that each computer on the internet was given a unique IP address, which could be accessed by a domain name such as www.sainsburys.co.uk.

The professor added: “You type in the domain name into your web browser to go there. Your computer has to go to a domain name server. As a user types in a domain name the browser first of all goes to a server and that server tells it what the actual IP address of that domain name is.”

All judges are now provided with computers and many of them use them extensively, including a judicial “intranet” or chat forum.

But one or two remain wedded to the tried and trusted methods of writing up their notes and judgments by hand.

The defendants – Younis Tsouli, 23, Waseem Mughal, 24, and Tariq Al-Daour, 21 – are accused of helping to distribute Islamic propaganda over the internet in support of al-Qaeda.

Tsouli, who is alleged to have surfed the web using the online name Irhabi007 – meaning Terrorist 007 – from his home in Shepherds Bush, West London, is said to have had links to an al-Qaeda group in Iraq led by Abu Musab al-Zarqawi.

It is also claimed that Tsouli and Mughal became involved in a murder plot by two Muslim extremists linked to a new group called al-Qaeda in Northern Europe.

Antiterrorist police were alerted after the two men were arrested in Bosnia with a video allegedly showing them preparing a suicide bomb vest.

The three defendants were arrested in raids on October 21 2005. Mughal, of Chatham, Kent, and Tsouli both deny conspiracy to murder, incitement to commit an act of terrorism and two counts of possessing a document or record likely to be useful to a person committing or preparing an act of terrorism. Al-Daour, of Bayswater, West London, denies six counts of possessing a document or record likely to be useful to a person committing or preparing an act of terrorism, two counts of incitement to commit an act of terrorism and conspiracy to defraud.

The trial continues.

They said it

“What are the Beatles?” judicial legend; may be apocryphal
“How can a bed be turned into a sofa?” Judge Seddon Cripps asks about a futon
Who is Gazza? Mr Justice Harman, who later also admitted ignorance of Oasis and Bruce Springsteen
“What is Linford Christie’s lunch box?” Mr Justice Popplewell (probably mischievous)
“What is this Teletub?” Judge Francis Aglionby, about a Teletubby jigsaw
“What is B&Q?” Lord Irvine of Lairg, Lord Chancellor and head of the judiciary

Source; Times database

Times Recommends

• 6 reasons not to give gifts this Christmas
• Remembrance Day: All the lonely heroes