Social media monitoring nabs would-be attacker: Israel
JERUSALEM (AP) – Israeli authorities have foiled over 200 Palestinian attacks by monitoring social media and sifting through vast amounts of data to identify prospective assailants ahead of time, reports Israel’s public security minister.
These pre-emptive actions put Israel at the forefront of an increasingly popular – and controversial – trend used by intelligence and law enforcement agencies around the world that use big data technology to track would-be criminals.
While the technology appears to be effective, its tactics drew angry Palestinian condemnation and have raised questions about civil liberties.
Public Security Minister Gilad Erdan, who oversees the national police force, said Israel’s use of algorithms and other technology had been an important factor in lowering the number of knife and shooting attacks in Israel.
He planned to share Israel’s knowledge with counterparts at an international security conference he is hosting this week.
“The experience we now have, we can help other countries deal with this kind of terrorism,” he said. Working with allies “can lead us to a much better result in fighting lone wolf terrorists”, he said.
But Hanan Ashrawi, a senior Palestinian official in the West Bank, called the Israeli profiling techniques “horrific” and an “added dimension” to Israeli control over Palestinian lives.
“They are trying to justify the various ways in which they violate the Palestinian people’s rights, including the right to due process and the right to privacy, using Facebook and social media to glean information to prove people’s guilt ahead of time,” she said.
In September 2015, Israel faced a wave of stabbings, shootings and car rammings by “lone wolf” attackers, or individuals unaffiliated with militant groups acting on their own. It was a significant departure from past waves of organised violence led by armed groups like Hamas.
Since then, Palestinians have killed over 50 Israelis, while Israeli forces have killed over 260 Palestinians, most of whom Israel says were attackers. However, the number of attacks has dropped significantly – from 170 “serious attacks” in 2016 to 90 last year to 25 this year, notes Erdan’s ministry.
Israel has blamed the attacks on anti-Israel incitement in Palestinian social media, while Palestinians say despondent attackers were driven by a lack of hope after decades of Israeli occupation and repeated failure in peace talks.
Research compiled by Er- dan’s office points in both directions. Erdan said interviews with jailed attackers had found many suffered from personal problems, such as depression or family pressure to enter an arranged marriage, but were also inspired to act, often with little notice, by violent material online.
Erdan, who is also minister of strategic affairs, the agency responsible for fighting the BDS movement, said Israel had turned to various technologies to counter the attacks.
That included facial recognition devices and smart cameras that detect suspicious behaviour in real time.
In addition, his ministry, working with the Justice Ministry and Shin Bet internal security agency, has created a team to scour an “ocean of data” on social media for objectionable content and to identify attackers before they act.
Members include psychologists, legal advisers and experts who have developed algorithms that analyse online activity. Violent posts, the suspect’s profile (age or hometown), and other supporting evidence are factored in.
“You have to look for the special words that might lead you to the conclusion that something is dangerous,” Erdan said. “The algorithm leads you to suspect someone.”
Attacks
The system has nabbed over 200 people who Erdan said confessed they were planning attacks. Suspects have included both Palestinians and Arab citizens of Israel, including cells allegedly inspired by the Islamic State.
“When you increase the number of people involved in monitoring the social networks, you more and more learn how to define the profiles you are looking for,” he said.
Erdan said there was always a “dilemma” about whether a potential suspect was a serious threat or not, and police often had just a few hours to decide whether to make the arrest. “It’s complicated,” he said. There were no figures on how many innocent people were misidentified as potential suspects. But Erdan’s office said in such cases, the people were quickly released.
Neither the Justice Ministry nor Shin Bet responded to requests for comment.
Ashrawi, the Palestinian official, questioned the claims that suspects had confessed, saying anyone could be pressured into confessing to anything. She also said Palestinians were subject to Israel’s military court system, which has a near 100% conviction rate. “What is incredible to me, the rest of the world is not horrified by what is happening here,” she said.