UK ‘big consumer’ of online terror content

The UK is the biggest consumer of online Islamist extremist terror content in Europe, a new report by a think tank said on Tuesday amid a spurt in terror attacks in the country.

The Policy Exchange study ‘The NewNetwar’ found Britain also ranks fifth in terms of world audience for extremist content after Turkey, the US, Saudi Arabia and Iraq, respectively.

After an in-depth analysis of clicks into such material, Britain emerged as the fifth most frequent location from which extremist content was being accessed online. The country also registered the largest number of clicks of such information

Britain also ranks fifth in terms of world audience for extremist content after Turkey, US, Saudi Arabia, Iraq

The country also registered the largest number of clicks of such info in Europe

in Europe.

“The evidence suggests that we are not winning the war against online extremism and we need to consider options for change,” said Martyn Frampton, the lead author of the report.

“If the internet companies won’t do what their customers want and take more responsibility for removing this content, then government must take action through additional regulation and legislation,” he said.

Contrary to previous claims, the report by the London-based centreright think tank revealed that Islamic State (IS) online output is not falling, but has remained consistent over the past three years.

Extremists are now increasingly relying on “swarmcast” technology – an interconnected network that constantly reconfigures itself and is highly resilient to disruption. “An average week will see over 100 new core articles, videos and newspapers produced by IS and disseminated across a vast ecosystem of platforms, file-sharing services, websites and social media,” it says.