Number of terrorist websites has exploded (pun intended)

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     The Politico story below shows that the number of Islamic terrorist websites has grown from 12 in 1998 to nearly 7,000 in 2009, and that number is likely higher today.  This reflects the explosion in internet usage since 1998. But it also reveals something else—how Islamists are aggressively using the internet to drive the ideology of jihad.

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W.H. online counterterrorism woes


The Internet 'offers terrorists a variety of mediums to disseminate messages,' a DHS study found. | AP Photo Close
By CHARLES HOSKINSON | 10/19/11 10:31 PM EDT
http://www.politico.com/news/stories/1011/66401.html
     Al Qaeda lost one of its best propagandists last month with the death in Yemen of U.S.-born cleric Anwar al-Awlaki, who had engineered much of its online recruitment and messaging.
     But al-Awlaki’s death in a U.S. drone strike, along with that of fellow propagandist Samir Khan, hasn’t ended the years-long problem of Islamist militant recruitment.
By the numbers:

     The Obama administration has made a point of trying to fight radicalization through the Internet as part of its counterterrorism strategy. But the diverse and broad network of websites and social media has proved hard to crack, and civil liberties concerns have tempered efforts to spy on communications.
     “The struggle against Al Qaeda will remain, in part, a battle of ideas,” Rand Corp. analyst Seth Jones wrote in a Sept. 30 commentary for the BBC. “Al Qaeda and individuals like Awlaki may represent a fringe group of extremists, but their message must be more effectively countered. That is something drone strikes cannot do.”
     Social media have been a particular problem, because users have adapted new forms of communication to fit the new formats. Many Arabic speakers on Facebook, Twitter, MySpace and other sites use what’s known as Arabizi, a form of colloquial Arabic written in the Latin alphabet and numbers instead of the traditional Arabic alphabet, allowing them to use a standard English-language keyboard to type their messages. But there’s no standard version of Arabizi. It varies from country to country, even among groups within countries and is affected by differences in dialect.
     Officials know that buried in the vast network of online communications are messages from Al Qaeda and other militant groups seeking recruits to launch terrorist attacks.
     “The Internet has become an important resource for disseminating terrorist propaganda and instructions to young persons [who] might not otherwise have direct contact with group recruiters or supporters,” a 2009 study for the Homeland Security Department found. “The Internet is accessible, cheap and anonymous. It offers terrorists a variety of mediums to disseminate messages and provides connections to recruiters and recruits that might not otherwise be possible.”
     “In recent years,” the study concluded, “there have been reports of a growing trend by which young persons have the potential to self-radicalize through the use of the Internet.”
      The study recommended that officials get a better handle on the tools, techniques and methods terrorists are using. But for years, the efforts to combat this radicalization have lagged behind the militants’ ability to broaden the scope of their communications.

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