Countering the Propaganda: Effective Strategies to counter the online campaigns of terrorist organizations

Abstract

With the growth of information technology, the use of the internet has become a basic requirement of everyday’s life. Not only business and education organizations, but the media, individuals and entertainment sector, use the internet to spread and share information. Moreover, microblogging sites and social media grabs the attention of consumers quite easily, as it is poorly regulated and access to such information is more convenient as compared to mainstream media. For this reason, the terrorist groups use social media to grab the attention of potential individuals, who could be misguided and recruited for malicious terrorist campaigns. Therefore, effective strategies are required to counter the narratives of such groups. For this purpose, a survey was conducted among the university students to identify effective strategies, which could help in countering the online presence of terrorist groups. The result shows that regulation of social media, active monitoring of online activities of children by their parents, and the role of public can help in countering the narratives of terrorist groups. Furthermore, it is also recommended that modern technologies like artificial intelligence could be used to track the online interests of individuals to prevent them becoming a prey to terrorist groups.