Lone Actor Terrorism

By Joe Whittaker & Chamin Herath On 15 March, 2019, a far-right terrorist conducted two consecutive attacks at Mosques in New Zealand’s capital, Christchurch. The attacker killed 51 people who had come for Friday Prayers and injured 40 more. In August of 2020 he was sentenced to life without the possibility of parole for his crimes. ...

Incels are a danger to society and to themselves. Technology has made the problem worse, but it can also help fix it. Involuntary celibates, or incels, believe that a socio-genetic conspiracy theory is preventing them from having sexual relationships with women. Denied their right to sex because society has deemed them unworthy, some of their ...

By Yannick Veilleux-Lepage The recent car-and-knife attack in London was just the latest in a string of high-profile incidents where assailants have used vehicles as deadly weapons. This type of attack has over the past few years become a feature of violent terrorism in the West and elsewhere – so where did it come from, and ...

VOX-Pol and University College London’s Dr. Paul Gill participated in the Asia Pacific Association of Threat Assessment Professionals’ (APATAP) annual conference in Singapore on 13 – 15 February. The conference focused on current and ongoing academic work, which falls in line with its goals of fostering and supporting cross-disciplinary study and management of threatening individuals ...

This blog post is a follow-up to last week’s post on Twitter activity following the terrorist attack that took place in Nice, France, on 14 July, 2016 and associated real-world events during the ensuing week. It is part of a larger project exploring hashtag activism in CVE. The first posts traced the online reaction to ...

This blog post and a follow-up next week analyse Twitter activity following the terrorist attack that took place in Nice, France on 14 July, 2016 and associated real-world events during the ensuing week. It is part of a larger project exploring hashtag activism in CVE. This first posts traces the online reaction to developments during ...

By Lisa Kaati and Fredrik Johansson Lone wolf terrorists can come in a variety of shapes and backgrounds and they are in general very hard to detect before they attack. As argued by previous research, there are no clear profiles for lone wolf terrorists since they have a large variation in factors such as social status, ...

Launching 4 November 2015 at the VOX-Pol Lunch Briefing Series In London, on November 4 2015, Dr. Paul Gill will present findings from his co-authored research report entitled ‘What are the Roles of the Internet in Terrorism? Measuring Online Behaviours of Convicted UK Terrorists’, based upon recent VOX-Pol funded research. This report will be formally launched ...

Dr. Paul Gill, Senior Lecturer in Security and Crime Science at VOX-Pol partner institution University College London, gave a fascinating presentation of his award-winning research into ‘Lone Actor’ terrorism on Wednesday 15 July at VOX-Pol partner ICSR at King’s College London. Dr. Gill focused on the empirical realities of ‘Lone Actor’ terrorism, how a single ...

by Paul Gill Over the past few years, a number of concerns have been raised about both the nature of the Internet’s relationship with terrorism and the threat posed by lone-actor terrorists. Despite these growing concerns, both literatures have lacked an empirical focus. The tendency to focus upon theory-building and illustrative examples means that we ...