Social Network Analysis
Tweeting terrorism: Vernacular conceptions of Muslims and terror in the wake of the Manchester Bombing on Twitter
March 4, 2025Both vernacular security studies and critical terrorism studies (CTS) offer constructivist analyses of security couched in understandings of security speak. However, neither adequately take account of the ways in which social media presents important opportunities for greater insight into how terrorism is constructed. This study analyses tweets posted after the 2017 Manchester bombing, exploring how ...
Social Network Analysis of German Foreign Fighters in Syria and Iraq
February 20, 2025Why do Westerners become foreign fighters in civil conflicts? We explore this question through original data collection on German foreign fighters in Syria and Iraq, and test three sets of hypotheses that revolve around socioeconomic integration, online radicalization, and social network mobilization. We conduct link analysis to map the network of German foreign fighters prior ...
The Gamergate Social Network: Interpreting Transphobia and Alt-Right Hate Online
December 19, 2024This paper explores the relationship of transphobia and other forms of harassment found across the events of the Gamergate hate movement through the development of an interactive social network analysis. With the social network being derived from hundreds of events tagged by hand, special consideration is given to the positionality and biases of its authors ...
A Graph-Based Approach to Studying the Spread of Radical Online Sentiment
October 29, 2024The spread of radicalization through the Internet is a growing problem. We are witnessing a rise in online hate groups, inspiring the impressionable and vulnerable population towards extreme actions in the real world. In this paper, we study the spread of hate sentiments in online forums by collecting 1,973 long comment threads (30+ comments per ...
“We Want You!” Applying Social Network Analysis to Online Extremist Communities
October 29, 2024Current literature on online criminal and deviant groups recognizes the role of online forums in the transfer of knowledge and socialization of members, but debates on the role of the Internet in the socialization and radicalization processes in the context of online extremist groups. This study contributes to the discussion by examining online radicalization process ...
‘Terrorism Informatics’ Part IV: Predicting Extremist Behaviour
August 8, 2024VOX-Pol Blog Post. ...
‘Terrorism Informatics’ Part II: Identifying Extremist Networks
August 8, 2024VOX-Pol Blog Post. ...
Mapping Global Cyberterror Networks: An Empirical Study of Al-Qaeda and ISIS Cyberterrorism Events
September 18, 2023This study explores the internal dynamics and networks of terrorist groups in cyberspace—in particular, Al-Qaeda and the Islamic State of Iraq and al-Sham (ISIS). Using a “Global Cyberterrorism Dataset” that features data on cyberterror attacks between 2011 and 2016, this research analyzes these two terrorist groups through the lens of a cyber-conflict theory that integrates ...