EU, US and Canada in joint ISIS propaganda attack

Law enforcement authorities from the European Union, Canada and the USA have launched a joint action against the ISIS propaganda machine in order to severely disrupt their propaganda flow. In a case which began at the end of 2015, the operation involved authorities from Belgium, Bulgaria, Canada, France, the Netherlands, Romania, the United Kingdom and the USA in a coordinated effort to hinder IS’s central capability to broadcast terrorist material for an undetermined period of time. The attack, which took place on 25 April, saw the UK’s Counter Terrorism Internet Referral Unit led in the referral process of top-level domain registrars abused by ISIS, meaning that the terrorist cell’s capability to broadcast and publicise terrorist material has been compromised. Rob Wainwright, executive director of Europol, said: “With this ground-breaking operation we have punched a big hole in the capability of IS to spread propaganda online and radicalise young people in Europe. I applaud the determined and innovative work by Europol and its partners to target a major part of the international terrorist threat prevalent in Europe today.” Commissioner Julian King added: “This shows that by working together we can stamp out the poisonous propaganda Da'esh has used to fuel many of the recent terror attacks in Europe. For too long the internet has been open to terrorists and those who seek to do us harm: those days are coming to an end thanks to this type of coordinated global work.”