Three Pakistani men taken into custody during a series of raids across the Northeast as part of the investigation into the failed Times Square car bombing may have provided money to the man who has admitted carrying out the unsuccessful attack, Attorney General Eric H. Holder Jr. said Thursday. 
 
 Mr. Holder said it was unclear if the men knew that the funds they provided were going to be used for an act of terrorism — one that Obama administration officials have said was aided and directed by the Pakistani Taliban. As of late Thursday, they were being detained on civil immigration violations and had not been charged with a crime. 
 
 Several people briefed on the case said that Faisal Shahzad, the naturalized Pakistani immigrant who the authorities say drove the crude car bomb into Times Square, traveled to the suburban Long Island community of Ronkonkoma in the days before the failed May 1 attack to collect several thousand dollars in cash, some of which he used to finance his plan. 
 
 But the people could not say whether the person who provided that money was one of the men taken into custody, and it was unclear whether the person was aware of what Mr. Shahzad intended to do with the money. 
 
 Two of the men taken into custody in the early morning raids were picked up after one of two searches in the Boston area, part of a sweep in which Federal Bureau of Investigation agents and local police officers executed six search warrants there, in New Jersey and on Long Island. A third man was taken into custody in Maine. 
 
 Mr. Holder called the development “a significant step” when he was asked for details about the three men. 
 
 He said the men were connected to Mr. Shahzad, 30, but investigators were “trying to determine exactly what the nature of the connection was.” 
 
 “There’s at least a basis to believe that one of the things that they did was to provide him with funds,” Mr. Holder said. “And so we are trying to trace back to see what exactly was the nature of those transactions, what was the purpose of the sharing of that — of those moneys.” 
 
 Statements released by the office of the United States attorney in Manhattan and the Boston F.B.I. office said the searches “do not relate to any known immediate threat to the public or active plot against the United States” and were undertaken based on evidence that was gathered in the investigation that came after the car bomb attempt. 
 
 Preet Bharara, the United States attorney in Manhattan, whose office is prosecuting Mr. Shahzad, said at a news conference that Mr. Shahzad, who has been providing information to agents and prosecutors since his arrest late on the night of May 3, had continued to do so. “Faisal Shahzad is still cooperating and still being interviewed by agents,” said Mr. Bharara, who was conducting a news conference in White Plains on an unrelated case. 
 
 Mr. Bharara added that agents and detectives from the Joint Terrorism Task Force “are still getting all the information we can in regard to any and all associates he may have.” 
 
 Mr. Shahzad, who has been charged with trying to use a weapon of mass destruction in the Times Square bomb attempt, has waived his right to remain silent and his right to a speedy appearance before a judge each day since his arrest, Mr. Bharara said. 
 
 “Mr. Shahzad will be brought to court at the appropriate time,” Mr. Bharara said. 
 
 The five-count criminal complaint charging Mr. Shahzad says he admitted driving a sport utility vehicle packed with a crude explosive device into Times Square; it also says he told federal authorities that he was trained to build bombs in Pakistan. 
 
 Federal authorities on Thursday did not expect to charge anyone else with terrorism, according to the official briefed on the investigation. 
 
 Also on Thursday, a senior American official confirmed news reports that at least one of a dozen people arrested in Pakistan following the attempted bombing had told investigators that he worked with Mr. Shahzad as he sought explosives training in Waziristan. The Washington Post reported on Thursday night, however, that there were inconsistencies between Mr. Shahzad’s story and the account of the Pakistani suspect. 
 
 Agents conducted searches Thursday in the Boston suburbs of Watertown and Brookline, and at two locations on Long Island, one in Centereach and another in Shirley. Agents from the Philadelphia F.B.I. office conducted searches in Camden and Cherry Hill, N.J., according to a spokesman for that office, J. J. Klaver. 
 
 Much remained unclear about the actions, including precisely why the warrants were executed and what evidence the federal authorities were seeking. ||||| Federal agents fanned out across the northeastern United States on Thursday and took into custody three people suspected of providing money to the suspect in the failed Times Square car bombing, officials said. 
 
 Two of the individuals were taken into custody in the Boston area and the third in Maine, officials said; they were all arrested on immigration violations. Federal agents were also executing search warrants in connection with the Times Square probe in New York and New Jersey. 
 
 Those in custody "may have provided money to [Faisal] Shahzad but may not have known what they were doing," said a federal law enforcement official, referring to the Pakistani-American charged in the attempted bombing. "The question is, did they provide money, did they facilitate and were they knowing?" 
 
 The official spoke on condition of anonymity because the search warrants are under court seal. 
 
 It was unclear how those arrested may have financed the plot, but the official indicated it was likely not through a hawala, an informal money-transfer network that is commonly used in South Asia and the Middle East and that has been linked to terrorist activity. 
 
 Since Shahzad's arrest May 3, investigators have been focusing on how he acquired the money to finance the alleged plot, law enforcement officials have said. They have also said they have been tracking the movement of a money courier who may have helped funnel the cash to him. 
 
 Shahzad brought $80,000 in cash into the United States when he returned from trips overseas between 1999 and 2008. 
 
 Senior Obama administration officials have blamed the Pakistani Taliban for the May 1 attempted bombing and said the group was responsible for planning and financing the botched attack, in which an SUV was loaded with explosives and parked in Times Square. 
 
 But it was unclear if the people arrested had ties to the Pakistani Taliban or other militant groups, a subject that officials indicated they are exploring as they interrogate the three arrested Thursday. 
 
 "That's the $50,000 question," said another federal law enforcement official, who also spoke on condition of anonymity. "To what degree they are involved, are they tied to an organization or to a specific individual, I don't know the answer to that." 
 
 U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents arrested at least two of the three people in a raid in Watertown, a suburb about 10 miles west of Boston, law enforcement officials said. They are being held on suspected immigration violations and are believed to have overstayed their visas in the United States, officials said. 
 
 One of those arrested was Pir Khan, who lives at a house in Watertown that was raided, law enforcement officials said. Khan is a director of a local cab company, records show. Also raided were gas stations in Brookline, Mass., the officials said. 
 
 Two federal search warrants were also executed on Long Island, N.Y., in connection with the Times Square investigation, said FBI Special Agent Richard Kolko, a spokesman for the FBI's New York field office. No arrests were reported in New York or in Camden and Cherry Hill, New Jersey, where officials said search warrants were also being executed. 
 
 The raids were "the product of evidence gathered in the investigation" and "do not relate to any known immediate threat to the public or active plot against the United States,'' said Special Agent Gail Marcinkiewicz, a spokeswoman for the FBI's Boston field office.
– Details are filling in on the half-dozen federal raids across the Northeast today in connection with the Times Square bombing case. Three people were taken into custody—two near Boston and one in Maine—on suspicion of providing money to Faisal Shahzad, reports the Washington Post. They're being held on immigration violations. Other raids were conducted on Long Island and in New Jersey. Authorities say the raids aren't a "big break," reports the New York Times, but rather an attempt to follow up on leads and figure out who provided the means for the attempted car bombing. The US has previously linked Shahzad to the Pakistani Taliban. Those detained "may have provided money to Shahzad but may not have known what they were doing," said a federal law enforcement official. "The question is, did they provide money, did they facilitate and were they knowing?"