5 alarming terror trends and what they mean for counter-terror strategies

With Counter Terror Awareness Week upon us (courtesy of the National Counter Terrorism Security Office), we’ve examined the latest trends in terror tactics and the changing nature of the amorphous global threat.

For what they lack in resources compared to the states against which they pit themselves, terrorists must compensate with the element of surprise. Small wonder that terrorists – who don’t all take the same master’s degree in how to be a terrorist – are neither consistent in methods nor targets, although patterns do emerge as successful attacks inspire copycat plots.

Being unpredictable is all too easy when potential targets are almost limitless, given that Islamic extremists essentially view their host society as a whole as irredeemably evil. Any target – any people (Muslims included), buildings or infrastructure – is fair game. When they’re happy to sacrifice themselves too, then they’re not even constrained by the need of an escape route.

Here are five trends in terrorism that have become more apparent this year and the implications for counter-terror approaches.

Environmental sabotage

Israel has been hit by a spate of wildfires since last Monday and several Israeli politicians are proclaiming the fires an act of terror.

Israel’s Defense Minister Avigdor Lieberman says authorities have evidence that at least 17 cases of the 110 recorded fire outbreaks, which have destroyed hundreds of homes and causing millions of dollars of damage, were attributable to arson. Israeli police have arrested several Arabs on suspicion of arson.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said that “any fire caused by arson or incitement to arson is terrorism in every sense of the word, and we will treat it as such.” Naftali Bennett, leader of the Jewish Home party that forms part of the sitting government, agreed: “This a major wave of arson … Terrorism in every sense of the word,” Israeli media has reported him as saying.

Whether the arson – if indeed arson is to blame – can be defined properly as terror attacks, we don’t know (that would largely depend on the motives). Either way, it could alert terror/guerrilla movements elsewhere to the potential of environmental sabotage – not just through fires but by poisoning agricultural land or rivers, for example.

Of course, terrorists tend to favour attacks on crowded places in order to maximise casualties and the psychological impact. However, train stations, shopping centres, sports stadia and so on tend to be well guarded and monitored by CCTV. Forests rivers and agricultural holdings, on the other hand, would represent a kind of soft underbelly.

While deaths from wildfires are rare and such attacks lack the immediate, dramatic impact of a bomb or machine gun massacre, they are immensely disruptive and destructive. Israeli health authorities say that more than a hundred people have been treated for smoke inhalation and other injuries across Israel, while 75,000 residents have been evacuated from their neighbourhoods in of Haifa.

It’s hardly practical to heavily guard every square mile of forest, farmland and waterway with security personnel or surveillance cameras. Complete security is never possible, but authorities will have to deploy innovative solutions – whether it’s phsyical barriers, drones or other hardware – that maximise security in a cost-effective way.

Far-right threat

Pointing to our Burkean preference for evolution over revolution British thinkers have often considered their country to be better insulated against the extreme ideologies of both left and right that convulsed continental Europe through the 1930s and 40s.

However, a rise in hate crime in the wake of the Brexit vote, the triumph of Donald Trump and the brutal murder of a sitting MP has generated anxiety that the threat from the Far Right is being underestimated.

“Over the past 12 months, there have been indications that the threat from [the] extreme right wing could be increasing and we are alive to this,” Neil Basu, senior national coordinator for counter-terrorism policing and deputy assistant commissioner, has said this week.

Anti-radicalisation scheme Prevent has reported a 73.5% rise in the number of referrals linked to the far right this year. “Currently just under 10% of all Prevent referrals relate to the extreme right wing, and we have put programmes in place to support those at risk of being radicalised,” said Basu.

The bad old days: Are we poised for a return to the 1970s?

Last week jurors at the Old Bailey heard how Thomas Mair, who was sentenced to a whole-life term for the murder of Labour MP Jo Cox, was an avid reader of Nazi propaganda, collector of Nazi memorabilia and a white supremacist.

Was the murder committed by Mair, who was also inspired by David Copeland, who targeted, gay, Asian and black people with a succession of bombs in 1999, a harbinger of Far Right attacks to come?

Basu insisted that “the overriding threat remains from Daesh-inspired groups”, but the authorities may now have keep a more watchful eye on the activities of organisations like the National Front and the BNP.

Internet of things

No household or everyday object, however mundane, is safe from the digital revolution. Whether most people truly want a smart toaster, smart clothing or a smart toothbrush remains to be seen, but it’s clear that the number of ‘things’ being connected to computer networks is growing exponentially.

And this applies just as much to commercial and public buildings as well as the wider urban environment. From trains to shopping centres, data is being generated in ever greater volumes with huge potential for generating energy savings, easing congestion and generally making cities more efficient and our lives easier.

It’s also multiplying the vectors of attack for cyber terrorists – and we’re ill prepared for it, according to Advent IM founder Mike Gillespie. “We’re patching IT systems on a weekly basis for Windows-based vulnerabilities. We’re seeing firmware vulnerabilities discovered on a daily if not hourly basis.

“We’re trying to plug holes because the planning wasn’t in place for the new cyber landscape that we’ve entered. And with the internet of things, the pace of change is getting faster and faster.”

Attacks on all manner of systems are already happening, continues Gillespie. “We’re seeing attacks on physical buildings, on CCTV systems, on air conditioning systems, vehicles, tram systems, train systems are all coming under attack. And sometimes for direct malicious intent with a view to causing accidents, damage, bringing down national infrastructure.

“If it’s a weak system, a legacy system, poorly installed and poorly patched, it then allows a foothold to be gained.

“It’s a bit like when you’re breaching a port: you need that initial bridgehead. You build, consolidate, then push on to attack elsewhere in a network.”

Vehicular attack

When Mohamed Lahouaiej-Bouhlel drove a HGV truck through the crowds celebrating Bastille Day in Nice, France on 14 July 2016, it demonstrated brutally that vehicles can be every bit as destructive as bullets and bombs.

Leaving 86 dead and injuring 434, it arguably highlighted the need for more robust physical barriers in public spaces. Security guards could do little in the face of a several-tonne truck mowing down people at speed.

Naturally, people don’t want to feel surrounded by a militarised ring of steel, so architects and urban planners need to secure open spaces without undermining the very qualities that make them a ‘crowded place/ in the first place (The growing importance of aesthetically pleasing, crash-tested street furniture forms the subject of a Marshalls-sponsored trend report we’re publishing soon on IFSEC Global).

Lone wolf attacks

Committed by actors without material support or communication with a terror group, so-called lone wolf attacks are nothing new.

However, a spate of attacks in France, Belgium, Germany and the US have highlighted the impotence of intelligence services when the attackers leave little or no evidence of their intentions and vindicated Isis’s media strategy. And if someone has no connections to radicals who are known to the authorities, then it’s extremely difficult – nigh on  impossible, even – for authorities to anticipate anything he’s planning.

With Al Qaeda plots the intelligence services could at least intercept communications and identify links between central command – in so far as such a diffuse network even had a central command – and various terror cells.

If Al Qaeda operated a franchise model then the attacks on the Pulse Nightclub in Orlando, the murder of two police officials in Magnanville, the Nice lorry massacre and the recent murder of a French priest were simply homages to the eideology of Isis. Recognising how effective such attacks are in instilling fear and evading detection, Isis has stoked the phenomenon, encouraging sympathisers within Europe to become self-starter terrorists – no contact with, nor direction from, Isis HQ required.

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