DARPA Fighting Propaganda And Lone Wolfs

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“Lone wolf” terrorist attacks are becoming the new normal. These individuals, almost unconnected to larger organisations, are hard to find, monitor, and apprehend on time. When traditional means of counter-terrorist surveillance are no longer adequate, it’s time to come up with new ways to prevent tragedy. The US Defence Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) has now set up a new programme to find out exactly how ISIS propaganda spreads, and how best to work against it.

The problem is that there is a dearth of information on the subject. “Many tools are available today to reveal whether rockets and bombs hit their targets or otherwise achieved their tactical goals. But no such tools are available to rigorously assess the effects of the volleys of information that are traded through social media and other communications channels,” reads the description.

To counter this, DARPA is applying its technical expertise in an effort to develop “automated digital tools that can help operational partners better understand how information is being used by adversaries and to quantitatively predict and assess—in real time and at scale—the effects of those campaigns and of countermeasures.” Simply put, DARPA is seeking to better understand how propaganda from groups like ISIS spreads and works, and how effective are counter responses.

Programme director Wade Shen seems like the best man for the job. A former associate group leader in the Human Language Technology Group at MIT’s Lincoln Laboratory, Shen has a wealth of experience in work on distinguishing language patterns between different individuals. At DARPA, he has previously worked on MEMEx, a search engine for the Dark Web. With his aid, we could soon see the emergence of effective tools against extremist propaganda.