The Marketing of Terrorism. Analysing the Use of Social Media by ISIS

Social media has played a central role in the digital era for almost a century, influencing almost all aspects of life. The use of social media in warfare is threatening not only one country but the whole global community, is a recent development. The famous speech by Abu Muhammad al-Adnani on social media inspired the bloody month of Ramadan in 2016 and showed the deadly power of social media inspired attacks and what the Islamic State is capable of achieving. Although the terrorist group has lost territory over the last few weeks of combat both in Syria and Iraq, and is on the edge of losing their main capital Mosul, IS still remains a hybrid threat. Consisting of military powers and an unmatched affinity of using social media as a cyber-war weapon, IS will continue to be a severe danger to the global community. This book aims to foster a deeper understanding of the use of social media for recruiting efforts by the so-called Islamic State (IS), and to analyse its propaganda methods in order to develop possible countermeasures. A special focus will be put on the method of recruitment of young Western foreign fighters. These individuals are the easiest to recruit for ISIS and pose the greatest risk to the global community, especially in regards to home grown terrorism and so-called lone wolf attacks. Since this area of research is very new and quickly evolving, the field still needs extensive research. It is difficult to analyse the use of social media content by the Islamic State due to limited information access and flow (encryption, propaganda, verification and inconsistency). The Islamic State is a military threat on the battleground as well as a potential cyber threat for the international community. Despite these challenging circumstances, this book will provide a new theoretical model based on the marketing model of a customer journey in connection with the main principles of storytelling. Ultimately, this research work will try to provide experts with a new and modern approach of analysis as a base for possible counter measures to weaken and combat the current threat posed by the Islamic State.