90% of terrorism conducted through social media

Washington: About 90 percent of organized terrorism on the Internet is being carried out through the social media, an expert has suggested. According to University of Haifa Profesoor Gabriel Weimann, terror networks are successfully utilizing the social media especially Facebook and Twitter to hire new members and gather new intelligence.

“The social media is enabling the terror organizations to take initiatives by making ‘Friend’ requests, uploading video clips, and the like, and they no longer have to make do with the passive tools available on regular websites,” he said.

His statement comes amid reports that Hezbollah is tracking the Israeli Army’s Facebook activity, and countries like the USA, Canada and the UK have instructed their soldiers to remove personal information from this network to restrain the possible monitoring by Al Qaeda.

“The most advanced of western communication technology is, paradoxically, what the terror organizations are now using to fight the West,” Weimann concluded.

Weimann has been conducting a study of encoded and public Internet sites of international terror organizations for the past ten years.

ANI