Facebook isn’t going to replace jihadosphere fora like the Fallujah message board any time soon. Those sites are for committed students of extremism, while Facebook is a tool for reaching those who might be curious about auditing the class. But there’s a dawning “recognition” in the jihadosphere, according to a recent Department of Homeland Security study of terrorists’ Facebook usage, of “the inherent value in exploiting a non-ideological medium, namely its wide user base that is comprised of the general public.”

Terrorists have been talking about “invading Facebook” for years. But early extremist activity on Facebook was tactical: cataloging “Crusader losses” in Iraq and Afghanistan and providing al-Qaeda-favorable spin on the media event of the day. These days, it’s about getting a broad pool of Muslim Facebook users to Like al-Qaeda. DHS quotes a post on an extremist message board urging terrorists to open Facebook accounts so they can “[m]ove from an elite society ([on] jihadi forums and websites) to mainstream Muslims, [encourage] their participation, and interact with them.”

Basically, DHS finds, al-Qaeda uses Facebook to launder its message through an outlet that the kids think is cool. Extremists quoted in the study talk about disguising their involvement in the group for maximum appeal. Partially, that’s to keep “the idolator dogs” of U.S. intelligence off their scent — they recommend takfiris sign up for Facebook using identity-masking tools like Tor — but it’s primarily to come across as a credible authority, someone who just happens to be using Facebook to get a point across.

“In order for the maximum number of ‘Facebookers’ to join your group, you should reveal to them that you are, for example, an expert in terrorist groups,” reads a piece of extremist Facebooking advice cited in the DHS study. “You don’t have to reveal that you sympathize with al-Qaeda. The group’s members will automatically sympathize with the organization once they become familiar with the organization’s tapes and jihadi operations. You must use artifice.”

That’s not to say that jihadis no longer see the tactical value of Facebook. They still want to “broadcast the losses” of the U.S. military and “expose the lies” of U.S. politicians. The DHS study, unearthed by the gang at Public Intelligence, notes that information on creating homemade bombs and shooting AK-47s has been posted to Facebook — particularly to its non-English variants, where it’s easier to post incendiary content. And much like how the Army worried in 2008 that Twitter will become a terrorist recon tool, DHS warns that terrorists could use soldiers’ status updates to perform “remote reconnaissance for targeting purposes.”

And that’s all the more dangerous considering Facebook’s global reach. The DHS study suggests extremists know social media offers them a motherlode: access to a wide range of impressionable people who might not ever think to visit a jihadist message board — but who might be motivated to after reading something on their News Feed, especially if their friends get interested. “Given that in terror networks social bonds tend to be more significant than external factors like shared hatred or ideology,” DHS writes, “social networking interfaces whose purpose is to virtually connect people based on such common social bonds clearly lend themselves to extremist use and recruitment efforts.”

Image: Facebook

See Also:

• Online Jihadists Plan for ‘Invading Facebook’
• Student, Online Terrorist Flunkie Arrested in Virginia
• Spy Fears: Twitter Terrorists, Cell Phone Jihadists
• Qaeda Mouthpiece: We’re Blacker than Barack
• Radical Imam Blogs His Support of Ft. Hood Shooter
• YouTube Yanks Jihadi Videos; Terror Wannabes Mildly Inconvenienced …

Authors: Spencer Ackerman

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