New Media: A new framework for traditional forms of terrorism

How to define terrorism? From a pure etymologic point of view, terrorism is the action of creating terror using violence or threat. “Terrorism is theatre” noted Jenkins in the 1970’s. For this purpose New Media could be a transmission channel of great importance. Terrorists learnt how to use New Medias to serve their goals, to define a counter-culture, and to redefine terrorism.

The first dimension new media bring to terrorist actions is the speed of information. Basically, with all the connections established by new media, terrorist found the best way to threaten the whole world by one action. For recruitment it offers new platform to touch a new public (for example some French teenagers enrolled for jihad in Syria after consulting blogs).  Through the internet, terrorist groups found a door to connect with a new public because of the participatory dimension of new media. Terrorism does not attract just a bench of rebels in distant countries but address its message to the whole connected world. The propagation speed depends on the media or the network used by terrorists. For instance a report from Simon Wiesenthal Center (a think tank working on human rights) noted that Twitter is most prone to propagate hate and terror than other networks. The work to remove terrorist contents from their platforms is not as intense as on Facebook. Moreover the news-turnover is faster on Twitter than on other networks. As a consequence Twitter is less controllable and easy to use for terrorists. Social networks are really to terrorist news diffusion, because of the news turnover it involves and this lack of control (Hezbollah principally uses his Facebook page to diffuse news and ideological messages, a lot of videos broadcast by Youtube…).

To adapt to this new action, counterterrorism uses the internet network as the first source of information. It raises the issue of civil liberties and counter terrorism appears as the main justification of private life violation. The news diffused by terrorist groups are tracked and analyzed. As a consequence, the groups diffuse enough information to terrify but avoid place identification, or hints to break their activities.

In order to use these new connections efficiently, terrorists use new media as a mean for their actions too. New Media are not just a mean of terror propagation but a mean of action too. We can notice that Facebook was used by Hezbollah to attract Israeli soldiers and kidnap them. Tv broadcast systems are targets of attacks too (for instance the attacks of al-Ikhbariya Tv channel in Syria on december 2013.

New media also change the targeting strategy of the terrorists. As theatre, terrorism adapts its action to the new of propagation it has. A double-game is played between media and terrorism as media need spectacle to broadcast and terrorist give them one of the most impressive ones and need a way to spread the terror (as a goal of their activities).

          Moreover this double-game is hard to catch. Terrorists are depicted as enemies by the media and the whole society. As a consequence new media forms (social networks, participating blogs…) are sometimes targets for terrorism and its mediatized new form: cyberterrorism. The ambiguity between new media and terrorism is there. With the arrival of new media, terrorism is not just a spectacle for tabloids but takes part in the media system. 

               

But why are terrorist activities on the front of the stage? New Media created a new system of social recognition by their participatory nature. As they spread terrors and involve more reactions, terrorist actions are more likely to create a buzz than any other news. Terrorism benefits a lot from this sensationalism. The danger it creates is over estimated by a lot of people because of its random targets. Moreover the attacks are often mystified: TV broadcast blurred video, ask expert about details and so on. The culture created by new media (films, videogames…) depicts terrorism as the supreme enemy. As a conclusion, this supreme enemy benefits a lot from this mystification of his action in term of recognition and social construction, involving more barbarity in the action to match with new media demand.