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Terrorist groups have proved in recent years that they are particularly adept at
utilizing the Internet and social media to facilitate their activities, including incitement
to commit a terrorist act, radicalization to violence, recruitment, training, planning,
collection of information, communication, preparation, financing and execution of
attacks. In addition to Al-Qaida, one terrorist entity that has benefited significantly from
ICT is the Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant (ISIL), also known as Daesh. ISIL and its
supporters exploit the Internet as a means to broadcast its ideology and has made effective
use of the vast reach and rapidly evolving communications environment provided by
social media applications, which also serve as a highly effective tool for ISIL recruiters,
who have succeeded in attracting a global pool of around 25,000 foreign fighters from
over 100 States.

The Secretary-General has the honour to transmit to the General Assembly the report prepared by the Special Rapporteur on the promotion and protection of the right to freedom of opinion and expression, David Kaye, submitted in accordance with Human Rights Council resolution 34/18. In this report, the Special Rapporteur evaluates the human rights law that applies to the regulation of online ‘hate speech’.

This Thesis contributes by proposing a method for identifying users believed to be at risk of radicalisation on social media, by utilising the social media networks of already radicalised individuals and a set of indicators derived from related work on radicalisation. In addition, this Thesis provides a new to the field, in-depth analysis of the personality traits of Twitter users at risk of radicalisation and how they may differ from ordinary users. The results show that the proposed data collection and annotation scheme is able to successfully identify individuals at risk of radicalisation, yielding an inter-annotator agreement, measured by Cohen’s Kappa, of 0.83. The analysis of the predicted personality traits shows that users at risk of radicalisation have common profiles for agreeableness and conscientiousness. When comparing the predicted traits to that of ordinary, non-radical Twitter users, the predictions show a marginal difference in distribution for agreeableness, openness, and conscientiousness, indicating a certain difference in personality between the two domains.

The Counter-Terrorism Committee unanimously adopted the Delhi Declaration at the closing of its special meeting on countering the use of new and emerging technologies for terrorist purposes, held in India on 28-29 October 2022.

The special meeting focused on three main areas: unmanned aerial systems, terrorist financing and information and communications technologies. The meeting also examined overarching issues relating to the use of technologies for terrorist purposes, to include human rights, gender considerations, and future programming by the international community. The Delhi Declaration provides non-binding guidance to Member States and stakeholders in countering terrorist use of new and emerging technologies.

The objective of the proposed open meeting is to assist the Committee to encourage States to better align their efforts in the area of countering terrorist narratives with the Framework and the guidelines contained in Council resolution 2354 (2017). Specifically, participants will be encouraged to:
1. Share information on trends and developments in terrorist narratives and effective measures to counter them, as well as on ways to measure and evaluate the effectiveness of such measures;
2. Discuss the benefits of a whole-of-society approach to countering terrorist narratives that involves a broad range of actors, including Governments, as well as youth; families; women; religious, cultural, and educational leaders; and other concerned civil society actors;
3. Share information on the benefits of countering terrorist narratives by amplifying positive and credible alternatives for audiences vulnerable to terrorist narratives;
4. Identify and analyse key aspects of the exploitation of information and communications technologies (ICT), including the Internet and social media, to disseminate terrorist narratives
5. Discuss ways to strengthen public-private sector engagement in countering terrorist narratives, both online and offline, including with respect to the TaT initiative and the work of the GIFCT
6. Share good practices in, and knowledge of, Member States’ compliance with the relevant international legal standards, including international human rights law, in this context, with respect in particular to the rights to freedom of expression and privacy
7. Encourage continued research into the drivers of terrorism and violent extremism in order to develop more focused counter-narrative programmes.

The present report is the second in a series of reports to be issued pursuant to
Security Council resolution 2178 (2014), which requires the Counter-Terrorism
Committee Executive Directorate to assess Member States’ capacity to stem the flow
of foreign terrorist fighters, identify good practices in that regard and facilitate the
delivery of related technical assistance to States in need. The first report adopted a
thematic approach to the foreign terrorist fighter threat, focusing on the
implementation efforts of 21 Member States. The second report adopts a regional
approach and analyses the efforts of 32 States in Central Asia, the Maghreb, East
Africa/Horn of Africa, Western Europe and Oceania/Americas.