On July 2, a large-scale Referral Action Day targeting terrorist content online took place at Europol involving units from Europol’s European Counter Terrorism and 17 countries (13 EU member states and 4 non-EU countries).
The referral activity targeted online content intended to inspire, instruct or train how to prepare or commit acts of terrorism. The action day led to the assessment of 1,906 URLs on 180 platforms and websites while terrorist content was referred to online service providers to be reviewed for breach of their terms and conditions.
Homemade bomb manuals and guides to conducting lone-actor attacks are examples of the devastating types of instructional material used by terrorist groups and their supporters. During the action day, experts detected, assessed and referred content including manuals and tutorials on how to prepare and carry out terrorist attacks. Some of the referred materials also provided instructions on how to stay anonymous online and how to avoid detection when planning a terrorist attack. The referrals targeted material disseminated in the context of jihadist, right-wing and left-wing terrorism.
