Online Library

On March 11, the Project on U.S. Relations with the Islamic World convened a panel to launch two new Brookings papers that break down the ideology and social media methods of the Islamic State to trace how the group rose in influence to become a global jihadi movement.

VOX-Pol Blog post.

Our country is still in the early stages of the 21st century where technology is advancing on a daily basis allowing the threat of terrorism, both domestic and foreign, to pose a serious risk to both its citizens and its assets if not addressed soon. There are numerous potentially vulnerable sites throughout the country that are still left under guarded and under-protected, specifically my emphasis for this project, the California Independent System Operator (ISO). This multilayered project utilizes public information from the Department of Homeland Security manual. The project also includes information from various national publications of defense principles and security countermeasures, as well as law enforcement protocols in place to deal with these types of security threats and potential breaches, scholarly articles, and industry trade journals.
The California ISO lacks physical and some virtual controls that make it more vulnerable to attacks. Specific recommendations have been made to ensure that the ISO is better protected and can still run an effective business.

VOX-Pol Blog post.

The Oxford Internet Institute’s Ian Brown and MIT’s Josh Cowls co-authored the VOX-Pol report entitled Check the Web: Assessing the Ethics and Politics of Policing the Internet for Extremist Material, which explores the complexities of policing the web for extremist material, and looks into its implications for security, privacy, and human rights. Below, Josh Cowls discusses the report with Bertie Vidgen, the editor of OII’s Policy and Internet Blog. Republished here with permission of the latter.