Global Terrorism Database Research Articles

The Eco-Terrorist Wave

ABSTRACT Within Terrorism Studies, Rapoport, D. C.’s (2004. The Four Waves of Modern Terrorism. In A. Cronin, & J. Ludes (Eds.), Attacking Terrorism: Elements of a Grand Strategy (pp. 47–65). Washington, DC: Georgetown University Press.) Wave Theory is a theoretical landmark that covers modern terrorism since 1880. However, this masterpiece neglects Eco-Terrorism, a phenomenon starred by the Animal Liberation Front (ALF), the Earth Liberation Front (ELF) and some other ideologically similar organizations. Even though it has been catching authorities’ attention around the world, such negligence towards the phenomenon has been replicated by others working on Rapoport's Wave Theory, leaving a question unaddressed: ‘Was/Is there an ‘Eco-Terrorist Wave’?’ Methodologically built upon a Time Series analysis on the Global Terrorism Database (GTD) (1970–2017), the present research harmonizes Eco-Terrorism under Rapoport's Wave Theory. Based on the evidence collected, the phenomenon has been evolving in a Rapoportian ‘Wave-Like’ pattern since 1972.

Using Global Terrorism Database (GTD) and Machine Learning Algorithms to Predict Terrorism and Threat

It is evident that there has been enormous growth in terrorist attacks in recent years. The idea of online terrorism has also been growing its roots in the internet world. These types of activities have been growing along with the growth in internet technology. These types of events include social media threats such as hate speeches and comments provoking terror on social media platforms such as twitter, Facebook, etc. These activities must be prevented before it makes an impact. In this paper, we will make various classifiers that will group and predict various terrorism activities using k-NN algorithm and random forest algorithm. The purpose of this project is to use Global Terrorism Database as a dataset to detect terrorism. We will be using GTD which stands for Global Terrorism Database which is a publicly available database which contains information on terrorist event far and wide from 1970 through 2017 to train a machine learning-based intelligent system to predict any future events that could bring threat to the society.

Identifying the global terror hubs and vulnerable motifs using complex network dynamics

Terrorism instills fear in the minds of people and takes away the freedom of individuals to act as they will. Terrorism has turned out to be an international menace today. Here, we study the terrorist attack incidents which occurred in the last half-century across the globe from the open source, Global Terrorism Database, and develop a view on their spatio-temporal dynamics. We construct a complex network of global terrorism and study its growth dynamics, along with the statistical properties of the anti-social network, which are quite intriguing. Normally, each nation pursues its own vision of international security based upon its mandate and particular notions of politics and its policies to counter the threat of terrorism that could naturally include the use of tactical measures and strategic negotiations, or even physical power. We study the network resilience against targeted attacks and random failures, which could guide the counter-terrorist outfits in designing strategies to fight terrorism. We then use a disparity filter method to isolate backbone of the network, and identify the terror hubs and vulnerable motifs of global terrorism. We also examine evolution of the hubs and motifs in a few exemplary cases like Afghanistan, Colombia, India, Israel, Pakistan and the United Kingdom. The dynamics of the terror hubs and the vulnerable motifs that we discover in the network backbone turn out to be very significant, and may provide deep insight on their formations and spreading, and thereby help in contending terrorism or framing public policies that can check their spread.

Protection of office buildings and spaces: A balanced approach to perception of terrorism risk in the common workspace

The scholarly literature regarding soft target terrorism indicates a likely shift from acts of terror against hardened targets to attacks against easier, softer targets. Office buildings and spaces, by their often open and inviting nature and capacity to house large numbers of people, fit within the commonly accepted model of soft targets. They are also designated by the US Department of Homeland Security as components of critical infrastructure. The literature, however, identifies very little terrorist threat in the ordinary work environment. To better understand the history of and potential for future attacks in the office environment, this article examines frequency-based terrorist attack data from 1990 to 2017, from the Global Terrorism Database, along with contemporary attack trend data from government reports and relevant journal articles. The article also discusses how the reporting of such events impacts on the public. Finally, the article recommends an objective and comprehensive forward-looking approach to understand the level of risk, which embraces not only historical data but ongoing intelligence, assessment and analysis.

Sink or Swim Together? the Diffusion of Death Among Allied Terrorist Groups

As more and more terrorist groups form alliances with one another, they become more and more dependent on one another for their survival. As much as terrorist groups reap benefits from alliances, there are also many risks. While most previous studies focus on how alliances among terrorist groups affect their longevity, this paper focuses on how the death of one group affects its partner’s longevity. This is the first paper of its kind to analyze the diffusion of death among allied terrorist groups. The diffusion of death is examined in this paper in terms of ideologies and regime type. Using a generalized equation estimation (GEE) model with data from the Global Terrorism Database (GTD) from 2001 to 2016, we investigate how death of one partnered terrorist group with a certain ideology (religious, leftist, or ethnicity-oriented) affects the longevity of its partners with similar ideologies. Also, using the same model, we examine how the demise of one partnered terrorist group operating under a certain regime type (democracy, autocracy, and neutral) affects the survival of its partners operating within regimes of the same and different types. The results indicate that when one terrorist group ceases to exist and both it and its partner are religiously oriented, the probability of death for the other terrorist group is lower as compared to those with other ideologies. Also, we find that regime type affects the diffusion process. When partnering terrorist groups are based in democratic nations, the diffusion of death among allied groups is more likely to occur. For partnering terrorist groups operating under different regime types, the diffusion of death is less likely as compared to those operating in nations with the same regime type.

Understanding the composition and evolution of terrorist group networks: A rough set approach

Nowadays, many resources for counter-terrorism operations are available for researchers belonging to different areas. In particular, the START project provides the Global Terrorism Database (GTD) that can be analyzed in order to provide, for instance, prediction models. The main idea underlying this work is using the historical data provided by GTD, which offers information related to terrorist attacks perpetrated since 1970, in order to conceptualize the behaviors of terrorist groups in specific time intervals. Such conceptualizations are, subsequently, used to understand the similarity between terrorist groups and elicit relations to represent terrorists’ networks. The above networks can be used to study the temporal evolutions of terrorist groups’ behaviors by applying the approach in different time periods along the timeline and studying differences among the resulting networks. The approach is mainly based on Rough Set Theory and Three-way Decisions Theory and provides an original similarity function based on the definition of boundary regions.

Characterizing Chemical Terrorism Incidents Collected by the Global Terrorism Database, 1970-2015.

The Global Terrorism Database (GTD) is an open-source database on terrorist incidents around the world since 1970, and it is maintained by the National Consortium for the Study of Terrorism and Responses to Terrorism (START; College Park, Maryland USA), a US Department of Homeland Security Center of Excellence. The consortium reviews media reports to determine if an event meets eligibility to be categorized as a terrorism incident for entry into the database. The objective of this study was to characterize chemical terrorism incidents reported to the GTD and understand more about the kinds of chemical agents used, the associated morbidity and mortality, the geography of incidents, and the intended targets. Chemical terrorism incidents from 1970 through 2015 were analyzed by chemical agent category, injury and fatality, geographic region, and target. During the study period, 156,772 terrorism incidents were reported to the GTD, of which 292 (0.19%) met the inclusion criteria for analysis as a chemical terrorism incident. The reported chemical agent categories were: unknown chemical (30.5%); corrosives (23.3%); tear gas/mace (12.3%); unspecified gas (11.6%); cyanide (8.2%); pesticides (5.5%); metals (6.5%); and nerve gas (2.1%). On average, chemical terrorism incidents resulted in 51 injuries (mean range across agents: 2.5-1,622.0) and seven deaths (mean range across agents: 0.0-224.3) per incident. Nerve gas incidents (2.1%) had the highest mean number of injuries (n = 1,622) and fatalities (n = 224) per incident. The highest number of chemical terrorism incidents occurred in South Asia (29.5%), Western Europe (16.8%), and Middle East/North Africa (13.0%). The most common targets were private citizens (19.5%), of which groups of women (22.8%) were often the specific target. Incidents targeting educational institutions often specifically targeted female students or teachers (58.1%). Chemical terrorism incidents rarely occur; however, the use of certain chemical terrorism agents, for example nerve gas, can cause large mass-causality events that can kill or injure thousands with a single use. Certain regions of the world had higher frequency of chemical terrorism events overall, and also varied in their frequencies of the specific chemical terrorism agent used. Data suggest that morbidity and mortality vary by chemical category and by region. Results may be helpful in developing and optimizing regional chemical terrorism preparedness activities.

Terrorist assassinations and societal unrest in Africa: a research brief

ABSTRACTThis exploratory research brief examines social unrest in Africa in the aftermath of terrorist assassinations. Assassination is a tactic of violence in modern terrorist campaigns and assassinations are interwoven across the African continent with social conflict events such as demonstrations and riots. Utilizing survival analysis, this article finds variation in the likelihood of social unrest across five African subregions and tests for the type of event most likely to occur after a terrorist assassination. Analyses of data on thirty-seven African states drawn from the Global Terrorism Database and Social Conflict Analysis Database from 1990–2015 suggest that demonstrations may be more likely than riots in the aftermath of a terrorist assassination in Africa and that these events are more likely to be spontaneous, rather than organized, in nature.

Introducing Extended Data on Terrorist Groups (EDTG), 1970 to 2016

This article introduces an extended data set of 760 terrorist groups that engaged in attacks during 1970 to 2016. Unlike most extant group data sets, the extended data on terrorist groups (EDTG) is not tied to terrorist groups and attacks listed in the RAND terrorism data; rather, EDTG is linked to terrorist groups and attacks given in the Global Terrorism Database. Terrorist groups’ variables in EDTG include ideology, main goals, start date, duration, base country, attack diversity, peak size, alternative endings (if relevant), and others. We display interesting features of EDTG through a series of tables and figures. Our EDTG-based survival analysis is at odds with some of the literature: for example, the demise of a leader and a larger share of transnational terrorist attacks increase the group’s odds of failure. After 2001, religious terrorist groups are more resilient than those with other ideologies. We also analyze terrorist group lethality and productivity.

Using the Haddon matrix to explore medical response strategies for terrorist subway bombings

BackgroundSince the 1970s, terrorist bombings in subways have been frequently occurring worldwide. To cope with this threat and to provide medical response countermeasures, we analyzed the characteristics of subway bombing terrorist attacks and used the Haddon matrix to explore medical response strategies.MethodsFirst, we analyzed 111 subway bombings from 1970 to 2017 recorded in the Global Terrorism Database to provide a reference for the strategy exploration. Then, we convened an expert panel to use the Haddon matrix to explore the medical response strategies to subway bombings.ResultsIn recent decades, at least one bombing attack occurs every 3 years. Summarized by the Haddon matrix, the influencing factors of medical responses to conventional subway bombings include the adequacy of first-aid kits and the medical evacuation equipment, the traffic conditions affecting the evacuation, the continuity and stability of communication, as well as the factors exclusively attributed to dirty bomb attacks in subways, such as ionizing radiation protection capabilities, the structure of the radiation sickness treatment network based on the subway lines, and the disposal of radioactive sewage. These factors form the basis of the strategy discussion.ConclusionSince subway bombings are long-term threats, it is necessary to have proper medical response preparation. Based on the Haddon matrix, we explored the medical response strategies for terrorist subway bombings, especially dirty bomb attacks. Haddon matrix can help policymakers systematically find the most important factors, which makes the preparations of the response more efficient.

A Global Analysis of Water-Related Terrorism, 1970–2016

ABSTRACT Terrorist organizations destabilize governments through violent and coercive acts that include the use of water resources as a target. Scholars in security studies recognize water as a strategic resource but have yet to systematically quantify and describe how water is used in the case of terrorism. This paper explores this gap at the nexus of the larger fields of terrorism and environmental security by offering methods to codify types of water-related terrorism events. Using the University of Maryland’s Global Terrorism Database, which includes information on terrorist events around the world, and employing aggregate data analysis, we highlight trends over time and space. We found that water-related terrorism is a method of terrorism widespread across most of the world and that water infrastructure is the main target of choice by most terrorist organizations. We identified 675 incidents of water-related terrorism that occurred in seventy-one countries. We identified terrorist organizations with the highest numbers of incidents and transboundary water basins most at risk for water-related terrorism incidents. This collective analysis identifies and codifies the number and type of water-related terrorism incidents that occurred from 1970 to 2016; describes spatial and temporal trends of those incidents; and provides information for decision-makers regarding water-related terrorism targets and associated risk.

The Lethality of Female Suicide Bombers

Over the past 50 years, suicide bombings have become an increasingly common tactic of politically motivated violence, and a rising number of these attacks feature women perpetrators. Prior literature suggested that female-perpetrated suicide bombings occurring between 1985 through 2008 inflicted greater casualties, which may account in part for their increased use by terror groups. The current research project ascertains whether sex continues to predict the lethality of suicide bombing attacks perpetrated by terror groups over the decade leading up to 2016. The study utilizes secondary data sampled from the Global Terrorism Database (N = 881) and the Chicago Project on Security and Threats (N = 1,722). A negative binomial model regressing lethality against perpetrator and conflict covariates did not observe a statistically significant relationship between sex and lethality. Male and female suicide bombers demonstrated similar lethality in suicide bombing events between 2005 and 2016, although scatterplots suggest some aberration during the years 2009, 2010, and 2016. Pairwise comparisons of perpetrator sex by conflict observed some variation in the lethality of attacks, with female suicide bombers from Al Qaeda, the Islamic State of Iraq, and Iraqi rebel groups found more lethal than male suicide bombers from Boko Haram and the Nigerian rebels. The current research project contributes to the literature by demonstrating the evolving nature of terrorism and tactics relevant to the lethality of politically motivated violent attacks.

Terrorism and the Varieties of Civil Liberties

How do government protections, and violations, of its citizens’ civil liberties influence the country’s exposure to terrorism? Existing research remains divided. We contribute clarity to these debates by examining the distinct effects of specific types of civil liberties: 1) physical integrity (e.g. freedom from extra-judicial torture and killing), 2) political liberties (e.g. freedom of expression and assembly), and 3) private liberties (e.g. freedom of thought and religion and property rights). We distinguish these civil liberties dimensions from the role of institutions for political selection (e.g. elections) and horizontal accountability (e.g. checks and balances; executive constraints). We argue physical integrity rights decrease terrorism, by reducing grievances against and increasing trust in the state, while political liberties increase terrorism, by both incentivizing violence among those with extremist goals and protecting their ability to organize. Empirically, we measure a country’s exposure to terrorism using the Global Terrorism Database. We isolate the effects of government actions on these separable civil liberties dimensions from each other, and from the effects of the state’s political institutions, by leveraging the Varieties of Democracy (V-Dem) data. Our sample covers 177 states from 1970 to 2018. We find evidence consistent with our hypotheses regarding the effects of the distinct component dimensions of civil liberties.

Instruments of violence: Female suicide bombers of Boko Haram

Groups engaging in political violence are utilizing women more frequently in operational roles, with females as suicide bombers being the most common role of women in terrorist attack events. In recent years, the trend in female suicide bombers has spiked and sources indicate that this can be attributed to the Boko Haram group in the Sub-Saharan Africa region, which has utilized more women as suicide bombers than any other group in history. Therefore, the present study seeks to address potential reasons for the high levels of women's involvement in suicide attacks by Boko Haram. Results of content analysis of publicly available, open-sourced media materials cited in the Global Terrorism Database suggests that women engaging in suicide bombing events affiliated with Boko Haram are being used as instruments for the group's violent objectives.

Terrorism Situations and its Challenges to European Union: A Longitudinal Statistical Analysis

Terrorism is increasingly threatening world peace and stability, not least during the post-9/11 era. In particular, viewed from Europe’s geographical proximity to areas of conflicts, terrorism is a greater menace to European continental peace, security and stability. As a natural consequence, terrorism becomes a top concern of the European Union (EU). In practice, it comes to be not merely necessary but also important to have a better and clearer idea about terrorist landscapes in Europe so that future counterterrorism will be well grounded in a faithful representation of reality. The authors, drawing upon data selected from the Global Terrorism Database (GTD), have categorised the terrorist incidents according to the different scales of casualties, provided a longitudinal overview of completed terrorism attacks from 1970 to 2015 with a special focus on the most terrorism-stricken Member States (MSs), and statistically analysed the terrorist situation within the EU and counterterrorism challenges. In doing so, authors have intention to find the ins and outs of terrorist incidents, to probe the motivations of perpetrators, and to clarify the faulty generalisations about terrorism. The article concludes that an increasingly stronger sense of nationalism is emerging, Islamic terrorism is not rising at a dramatic speed but in a more destructive way, and more importantly civilians are becoming the dominant target group of terror attacks. It is further argued that these three factors are not only the tough challenges but also top concerns of counterterrorism.

Quantitative Research on Global Terrorist Attacks and Terrorist Attack Classification

Terrorist attacks are events which hinder the development of a region. Before the terrorist attacks, we need to conduct a graded evaluation of the terrorist attacks. After getting the level of terrorist attacks, we can fight terrorist organizations more effectively. This paper builds rating models for terrorist attacks, hidden or emerging terrorist organization classification discovery models, terrorist organization alliance network models and more, through quantitative research of the Global Terrorism Database, which solved the event classification. Through studying relevant literature and the variables of the Global Terrorism Database, this paper sorted out 25 observation variables related to the impact level (level of harm) of terrorist attacks. By establishing a mathematical model of factor analysis, 11 factors related to the impact level (level of harm) of terrorist attacks were constructed, and the variance of the contribution of each factor was used as the weight to calculate the comprehensive rate of the impact level of each terrorist attack. Finally, K-means clustering method is used to cluster and analyze the comprehensive rate of impact level, and the top 10 terrorist attacks with the highest impact level in the past two decades were obtained.

Addressing the Myths of Terrorism in America

In the aftermath of 9/11, the intersection of sensational media coverage, public fears, and political motivations has contributed to misconceptions about the nature of terrorism and the perpetrators of extremist violence. The current study uses data from the Extremist Crime Database and Global Terrorism Database to address the myths of terrorism in the United States. We examine jihadist-inspired, far-right, and far-left incidents to provide an empirical critique of turn of the century popular discourse that suggests terrorism (1) incidents are increasing, (2) fatalities and injuries are increasing, and is committed by (3) internationally based, (4) jihadist-inspired extremists, (5) of Arab decent, (6) working in organized groups. The results highlight the reality of the terrorism problem finding incidents are decreasing and often involve no deaths or injuries. Additionally, terrorists are more often domestic-based, White, far-right extremists, acting alone. We conclude with a discussion of findings and implications for public knowledge and policy responses to terrorism and extremist violence.

Counter Maritime Terrorism: Multitrack Diplomacy

With these special issues of defense studies, the researchers placed the issue of terrorism maritime as a threat to disrupt the security and sovereignty of a country. The Southeast Asia region is inhabited by some island nations, such as Indonesia and the Philippines, the strongest sign of growth and development of maritime activities of terrorist groups. Acts of a maritime terrorist group is a form of the real threat that unwittingly compromises the security and sovereignty of a country. The targets of a maritime terrorist group are all the things associated with the sea, either infrastructure or cross-country vessels transporting goods of high economic value. Since 1998 up to 2016, the Global Terrorism Database noted an act of terror in the sea area of about 368 incidents. Indeed, the numbers are still much lower than the terrorism that makes religious figures/institutions as the target, but because of marine resources being most potential, everyone will fight over this great potential and can impart to the emergence of conflict and even war in the future. Therefore, researchers sought anticipatory measures to counter maritime terrorism solutions, especially in the Southeast Asia region. In the end, the researchers analyzed the strategy of soft power to counter maritime terrorism, precisely multi-track diplomacy, where the problem of terrorism is used as a general problem because it is not the state or government that resolves it, but all relevant stakeholders of maritime counter the terrorism.

Profiling Lone-Actor Terrorists: A Cross-Sectional Study of Lone-actor Terrorists in Western Europe (2015–2016)

Lone-actor terrorism is a growing threat in Western European countries as the numbers of lone-actor terrorist attacks have multiplied over the last 15 years. However, knowledge on this type of terrorism is insufficient. This current study evaluates whether there are any common personal, social, psychological, and operational characteristics among lone-actor terrorists (LATs) and whether any profile can be drawn in regard to a lone-actor terrorist. The authors identified 36 LATs between January 1, 2015, and December 31, 2016, in Western European countries through the Global Terrorism Database. The study profiled these LATs regarding their sociodemographic characteristics, attack characteristics, method of radicalization, ideology, modus operandi, and typology. Findings of this study show that lone-actor terrorism in Western Europe has undergone new changes, and although there is no single unique profile for LATs, there are common characteristics that warrant further studies. (Less)

Hazard Grading Model of Terrorist Attack Based on Machine Learning

Abstract In this paper, there is no unified grading standard for the harm of terrorist attacks. A classification model of terrorist incidents based on machine learning is proposed. First, the data related to the hazard in the Global Terrorism Database (GTD) is extracted and preprocessed. Secondly, the data is extracted by principal component analysis, and all events are aggregated into 5 by K-means clustering. Again, the entropy method is used to calculate the weighting coefficient of each indicator, and the comprehensive score of the hazard of each type of terrorist attack is calculated. Finally, the scores are divided into 1-5 levels of hazard grading models in order of high to low. The results show that the hazard grading model can scientifically and objectively quantify terrorist attacks.