Prime Minister Dominique de Villepin has diverted resources to monitoring blogs?short for Web logs?in an effort to anticipate the movements of the protesters, who have set fire to thousands of cars since the unrest began on October 27.

Two youths were placed under official investigation, one step short of pressing charges under French law, early on Wednesday on suspicion of inciting violence over the Internet after urging people to riot in blogs, a judicial source said.

"This is a new dimension to take into consideration," said Internet security expert Solange Ghernaouti-Helie.

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"I think they learned from what they saw on television. I think anti-globalisation movements and rioters have the same way to organize?or to disorganise the police," he said. "It's old guerrilla tactics with modern technology." Fonte.