Critics have displayed their discontent at the shutting of terrorists from the online world especially by suspending their twitter accounts, but it is indisputable that the results of this operation have been too significant to be ignored.
ISIS has staged information warfare which ought to be met in equal style. They conduct meager attacks which they magnify and find real benefit from boasting online among themselves and their sympathizers.
As a result there are ISIS beheading videos everywhere on the internet which cause upheavals and unrest among threatened countries in which the radicals have declared their interest in carving an Islamic state. It is therefore high time the videos are considered unsuitable for consumption thus their being abstracted from their viewers. And the best way to achieve this is by obstructing their dissemination, thus blocking their creators’ internet accounts.
Twitter was fast in staging the blocking attack and the reaction of ISIS provided real evidence as to where the Islamists’ strength really lies. It is in their boasting online. The insurgent group immediately issued death threats against twitter employees, including co-founder Jack Dorsey over the blocked accounts.
Twitter followed in the steps of YouTube by proactively shutting down ISIS-related Twitter accounts, with the aid of the UK’s counter-terrorism internet referral unit.
At least 100 twitter accounts that were blocked were used to promote propaganda and thus posed great security threats.
The ISIS release the terror videos to plagued countries after any of their successful operations to generate world attention on their ungrounded achievements, create fear and win more recruits. Their videos have acted as a magnate, pulling jihadis from all corners of the world to fight in the Islamic State, with most young men and women travelling from the West. It is all these three aspects that blocking their accounts aim to work at their disadvantage.
It goes without mention that the ISIS means of retaliation to this course could be coupled with attacks but then with their objective of being noticed trodden upon, it will be a waste of valuable energy which they badly need to carve an Islamic State.
