Private Sector Engagement in Responding to the Use of the Internet and ICT for Terrorist Purposes
September 18, 2023
On the one hand, the companies in question feel a business incentive to create a digital environment where their users feel safe, and are increasingly compelled by governments to cooperate in blocking, filtering, countering or removing content or accounts on the grounds of public safety or national security concerns. In addition, users expect the companies ...
Religious Appeals in Daesh’s Recruitment Propaganda
September 18, 2023
The self-proclaimed Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (Daesh) employs a complex online media strategy to recruit targeted demographics. Its success has exacerbated conflicts in Syria, Iraq, Libya, and elsewhere, and has become a concern for the international community. The Carter Center (the Center) is working to counter Daesh’s recruitment propaganda efforts by undertaking in-depth ...
The Virtual Caliphate: ISIS’s Information Warfare
September 18, 2023
ISIS will likely maintain the capacity to align its military and information operations (IO) in the coming years. Continuing conflicts and the plodding effort to address the underlying conditions where it has taken root will likely help ISIS retain physical sanctuary and command and control capability in Iraq, Syria, and North Africa, even if it ...
Women and Violent Radicalization
September 18, 2023
As myths, stereotypes and media representations circulate about the several hundred Western women who have gone to Syria and joined the jihadists, it seems to us essential to try to understand the motives and explanatory factors behind the radicalization of these girls and women. What mechanisms and processes lead them to become radicalized and to ...
Extremist Content and the ICT Sector: A Global Network Initiative Policy Brief
September 18, 2023
The role of information and communication technology (ICT) companies in responding to alleged terrorist or extremist content has become one of the most challenging issues for freedom of expression and privacy online. In July 2015, GNI launched a policy dialogue to explore key questions and considerations concerning government efforts to restrict online content with the ...
Anti-Blasphemy in the Digital Age: When Hardliners Take Over
September 18, 2023
Given the rise of media and information technology, the debate over anti-blasphemy laws has become one of international importance. Cutting across different regions and faiths, blasphemy laws have triggered instability, empowered extremists, and increased sectarian violence. With frequently vague wording, they are open to whimsical interpretations, resulting in scores of human rights abuses, and violating ...
Cruel Intentions: Female Jihadists in America
September 18, 2023
The notion of women in terrorism pushed its way to the forefront of the American mindset on December 2, 2015, when Tashfeen Malik and her husband, Syed Farook, opened fire at the Inland Regional Center in San Bernardino, California. After the couple killed 14 and injured 22, the growing threat posed by female jihadists in ...
Digital Citizens: Countering Extremism Online
September 18, 2023
The last half century has witnessed a burgeoning information revolution that has transformed our societies beyond recognition. The development of sophisticated computing, the technological reorientation of vast segments of the global workforce, the invention of the internet and most recently the proliferation of social media technology has radically changed the ways we work, live, develop ...
The Impact of Counternarratives
September 18, 2023
The concept of creating counter-narratives in order to push back against extremist recruitment and propaganda has become well established in recent years. In practice, however, it has proven difficult to curate this content in a systematic way, target it toward at risk audiences, and – most importantly – measure constructive impact on their behaviour. Over ...
Counter-Speech on Facebook
September 18, 2023
Facebook serves more than 1.5 billion people globally. Although the majority of people use the site for positive purposes, there are some who use the platform in negative ways. With that in mind, Facebook has created a set of policies – its Community Standards – detailing what type of content people can and cannot post. ...