Financing of Terrorism and Social Media Platforms

 

From January to March 2020, the Counter Extremism Project (CEP) analyzed the current procedures and policies of major social media platforms and compared that to the prevalence of terrorism financing.

The study involved two steps. First, CEP tested whether major terrorist organizations, including al-Qaida and the Islamic State, are able to maintain accounts on large social media platforms as a means for terrorism financing. In January 2020, CEP found that around a dozen of the most notorious financiers of terrorism were allowed to maintain social media profiles.

Secondly, CEP analyzed the community standards of these large social media platforms. They compared the current guidelines to a 2019 report by the Global Research Network on Terrorism, which had noted that there were significant gaps in their policies about terrorism financing. CEP found no significant improvement, indicating that social media firms do not prioritize protecting their sites against terrorism financing.

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