Terrorism and the Internet

Media and Civil Society/ Week 10: The Internet and Uncivil Society

Daniel Ruiz de Garibay- 0407756

The Internet and Terrorist Organisations

Introduction

Some scholars have argue that the nature of the Internet: the ease of access, the chaotic structure, the anonymity, the international character, the vast potential audiences and the fast flow of information, make of the Internet an easy and effective arena for terrorist organisations.

This essay focuses on the uses of the Internet by terrorist organizations and addresses the following question: Is the use of the Internet by terrorists different from that of other, "conventional" means of communication?

Political communication and terrorism are intimately related. In fact, terrorism can be defined as violence used to articulate a political message (Reilly: 234). For communication scholars terrorism can be can be analyzed much like other media of communication, consisting of four basic components: transmitter (the terrorist), intended recipient (target), message (bombing, ambush) and feed back (reaction of target audience). However other authors argue that terrorism is aimed not at the actual victims, but rather to people watching on televisions (Weimann, 2002: 317). Thus, Numerous terrorist organizations have realized the potential of media-oriented terror as a means of effectively reaching huge audiences. In this sense the Internet may play an important role. Traditionally governments and several media organizations have response in a restrictive way to the attempt of terrorist to manipulate and use the media in their own benefit. These included limiting terrorists' access to the media, reducing and censoring news coverage of terrorist acts and their perpetrators, and minimizing the terrorists' capacity for manipulating the media. However, because of its nature, the Internet allows terrorist organizations to reach their audiences and transmit message easier and freely that through the conventional mass media. The Internet most notably offers:

Ð'* easy access;

Ð'* little or no regulation, censorship, or other forms of government control;

Ð'* potentially huge audiences spread throughout the world;

Ð'* anonymity of communication;

Ð'* fast flow of information;

Ð'* inexpensive development and maintenance of a web presence;

Ð'* a multimedia environment (the ability to combine text, graphics, audio, and video and to allow users to download films, songs, books, posters, and so forth); and

Ð'* the ability to shape coverage in the traditional mass media, which increasingly use the Internet as a source for stories.

The use of the Internet by Terrorist organizations

The Internet has proved to be of utility for terrorist organizations in two different ways. First, terrorist will use the Internet