It’s probably the biggest hot-buttoned news story of 2014: the rise of terrorist group ISIS, or Islamic State. Hardly a day goes by when we don’t hear about an evil deed done by these extremist thugs. It seems that no one is immune, not even technology or social media.
On one of ISIS’s Twitter accounts, they’re calling for the assassinations of Twitter employees in the United States and Europe. Their tweets have called for sleeper cells and ‘lone wolves’ to kill employees and bring war to them. These same vile, vicious tweets told San Fransisco Twitter employees to watch their back. There is a suspect in question: Twitter account @Dawlamoon, an account operated to be loyal to ISIS, is at the center of this story. It isn’t confirmed if Dawlamoon is a true social media mouthpiece of ISIS, just one of their cheerleaders, or if it’s just blowing smoke to make headlines. But it is rumored, just that, rumored, to be an ISIS forum. But after the threatening Tweets were posted on back on Monday Sept 8th, the account was suspended. Lately, Twitter has been working around the clock to shut down all pro ISIS based accounts. Unfortunately, the terrorist organization is using techniques to counter such suspensions.
We’re living in a time that was unthinkable just 10 years ago. ISIS and other terrorist groups are using social media to push the propaganda offensive and the charm/charisma offensive to win people over to their twisted, sadistic cause. They even have You Tube videos of themselves giving ice cream to children. We in the technology community must do all we can to counter these lies before more people get duped. Twitter trying to suspend their accounts is a great start. Now I believe in free speech as much as anybody, but not when you’re threatening people’s lives. Let’s use our voices, vlogs, blogs, social media pages, smartphones, desktops, laptops and other devices to expose these thugs for who they really are. What else can we do to combat this threat?