KOZHIKODE: Fair warning FBians. Think twice before you like or share videos/ posts on Facebook. The Islamic State (IS)’s cyber wing is watching you. They use the revealed social media preferences to shortlist a person as a probable recruit and carry out further indoctrination drive to attract gullible young blood to its fold.
Residents of Kerala like to call their lush south Indian state, “God’s own country”. However, many from this state have been falling prey to Islamic State’s ideologies and they are mostly recruited via the social platform. Among the many incidents, recently 21 young people from Kerala went missing and were traced to the Islamic States.
Intelligence agencies across the country and the state, in general, have been wary of the online recruitment operation of the IS. The agencies have been pursuing a deradicalisation operation to free those young blood who have fallen for it. It was based on the submissions made by a couple of youths in Maharashtra that the agencies were able to dig deep into the online recruitment ring of the IS. Police said, the cyber wing of the IS is scouting for vulnerable youth on social media.
“The cyber wing, which runs various fake accounts, posts videos and articles exhorting people to take up arms to protect slam,” said Thiruvananthapuram Range IG Manoj Abraham. “If anyone likes or shares this particular post, the IS contacts the person,” he said. Manoj said the cyber wing of Kerala Police has been tracking the online activities of certain suspected fake IDs which have been propagating IS/jihadi ideologies.
Probe into the missing case of 21 Keralites who left for Syria to join IS has revealed Abdullah Rasheed, who played a prominent role in luring in others to go to Syria, was very much active on social media. “Once vulnerable youths are identified on social media, local agents of the IS keep constant track of them. Abdullah Rasheed was one such local handler who facilitated the journey of the Malayalees to Syria,” said an intelligence officer.
Deradicalisation operation
Intelligence agencies across the country and the state, in general, have been wary of the online recruitment operation of the IS. The agencies have been pursuing a deradicalisation operation to free those young blood who have fallen for it.