It appears that jihadists are continuously learning and adapting in the cyber world. The counter terrorism community needs to keep up. The two suggestions given by forum participant “Riah al-Ghobar” on the jihadi forum Alhesbahweb.net under the topic “Guerrilla Warfare on the Mountain Range of the Internet” include creating support email systems and Encrypted Messenger software. This would ensure the continued of the flow of ideological influence via the internet in the event that Islamist Websites are hacked and shut down. Driving them “underground” in the cyber world will not solve the problem but may inadvertently make counter-terrorism efforts more complex. As a consequence, efforts against ‘cyber-terrorism’ need to be able to penetrate into closed networks. This means that their networks are more discriminatory and securely protected.Anybody who intends to join these networks would need to acquire more passwords and permission from the administrators. The problem would arise when the administrators implement stringent filtering methods, such as asking for evidence that the user is committed to the cause through writing jihadist rhetorics, in order to gain membership and access into these networks.Such arrangements would also make it easier for the administrators to monitor users more closely and single out potential misfits.
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