EU warns of chilling new terror menace 25 years after 9/11 as online youths seek violent thrills
European authorities are concerned about a rise in 'nihilistic violent extremism' among online youth, 25 years after the 9/11 attacks. While jihadist groups remain a threat, police are increasingly tracking decentralized online communities that promote violence for its own sake.
Why it matters
The shift toward non-ideological, online-driven violence presents new challenges for counter-terrorism and domestic security agencies.
A quarter of a century after the Al-Qaeda attacks on the U.S., jihadist groups still pose a major threat to security in Europe, but a new menace has surfaced that is driven mostly by young people online and the authorities are worried.
The exact size of the network behind what is being called nihilistic violent extremism is unclear. But police investigators from nine European countries found about 4,340 URL web addresses linked to “The COM”, as the online community has become known, during a campaign to disrupt it in June and July.
“It's violence for the sake of violence,” European Union Counter-Terrorism Coordinator Bartjan Wegter told The Associated Press in an interview, ahead of the 25th anniversary of the September 11 attacks on New York and Washington in 2001.
Get smarter about the news
Sign up free for a feed built around what you actually care about, Dive Deeper research on any story, and the full text of every article.
Create free accountAlready have an account? Sign in