Conspiracy Theories: The New Terrorism Threat?

The popularity of social media as a news source coupled with impact of the pandemic is driving greater engagement of conspiracy theories. Whilst not currently defined as a terrorism threat there is growing concern of the real world impact these theories can have. Concerns raised by Gilles de Kerchove, European Union (EU) Counter Terrorism Coordinator in the August edition of CTC Sentinel who stated:

‘We may see the development of other forms of extremism like technophobia – With the development of disruptive technologies, some people may feel disenfranchised or marginalized by this rapid evolution of technology and its impact on society, and they might react violently.’

We have already started to see such incidents here in the UK, unidentified attackers have damaged or destroyed over 70 mobile phone towers since April this year. Police linked these attacks to an online conspiracy theory propagated on several blogs that links the spread of the COVID-19 virus to 5G signals. As well as targeting infrastructure, some 40 telecoms engineers have been attacked or threatened, with one being hospitalised by a stabbing attack.

The UK has seen its first demonstrations linked to protest lockdown restrictions, vaccines, 5G and supposed establishment plots last month in London coupled with many towns and cities seeing demonstrations from environmental protesters. Although, not violent they do suggest a growing unrest on ideological themes that have radical elements.

De Kerchove continued by saying: “Let us suppose that it is linked to environmental violence, people who believe that the world is close to collapsing and government is not taking the right decisions to address the warnings on global warming. They might believe that they need to use violence to wake the government up. You could see developments around this technophobia linked with some sort of ecological extremism”

Inperio are constantly reviewing the risk posed here in the UK and around the world to ensure our Terrorism protection is relevant and contemporary. Our definition of a Terrorism event continues to lead the market ensuring our customers are covered against the evolving threat.