Islamic State’s Twitter network is decimated, but other extremists face much less disruption
Our software system continuously monitored the pro-IS accounts in our dataset to ascertain if and when they were suspended. In total, 455, or 63 percent, of the pro-IS accounts in our dataset were suspended in just three months. However, an unknown number of accounts were disrupted with such speed and intensity that we were not able to include them in our dataset. Given this and other considerations, we estimate that the total loss of IS-supportive accounts over the period was probably greater than 90 percent.
These results are in stark contrast to the findings of seminal research undertaken by JM Berger and Jonathan Morgan on IS supporter accounts in 2014. In their analysis of 20,000 such accounts between September 2014 and January 2015, they observed suspension of just 678 accounts, which accounted for a total loss of just 3.4 percent.
Differential disruption
But while it appears that Twitter is now severely disrupting pro-IS accounts on its platform, our research found that other jihadists were not subject to the same levels of take down.
For comparison, we entered a sample of 451 other jihadist accounts into our database, including those supportive of extremist groups Hay’at Tahrir al-Sham, Ahrar al-Sham, the Taliban, and al-Shabaab. Of these, 163 were eventually suspended. But while more than 30% of pro-IS accounts were suspended within two days of their creation, less than 1 percent of other jihadist accounts met the same fate.
Their longer life meant that non-IS jihadist Twitter accounts had the opportunity to send six times as many tweets, follow or “friend” four times as many accounts and, critically, gain thirteen times as many followers as pro-IS accounts.
We believe that our pro-IS Twitter account dataset is as close as possible – taking into account some caveats detailed in our report – to a full dataset of explicitly IS-supportive accounts with at least one follower for the period studied. The dataset of other jihadist accounts, on the other hand, no way reflects the true number of these accounts on Twitter.
Wider considerations
Our research shows that Twitter is no longer a conducive space for IS supporters. Twitter’s aggressive pro-IS account take-down activity means that the once vibrant and extensive IS Twitter network is now almost non-existent.
The almost exclusive focus on IS’s Twitter activity by researchers and others means that the online activity, including the Twitter activity of non-IS jihadis, the extreme right, and others, has largely gone under the radar. Professionals working in this area such as content moderators, law enforcement officers and researchers need to pay more careful attention to this activity going forward. This should include a focus on the diversity of other platforms besides Twitter being used by the whole range of other violent extremists and terrorists.
The migration of the pro-IS social media community from Twitter to the messaging service Telegram particularly bears watching. Telegram currently has a lower profile than Twitter with a smaller user base and higher barriers to entry, with users required to provide a mobile phone number to create an account. While this means that fewer people are being exposed to IS’s online content via Telegram, and are thereby in a position to be radicalized by it, it may mean that Telegram’s pro-IS community is more committed and therefore poses a greater security risk than its Twitter variant.
Suraj Lakhani is Lecturer in Criminology & Sociology, University of Sussex. Maura Conway in Professor of International Security, Dublin City University. This article is published courtesy of The Conversation (under Creative Commons-Attribution /No derivative).