Like for an explosive, share for a hit: How criminal organizations turned the web into a terror arena
In an era where every person has a smartphone with a camera, shooting, an explosive device, or arson no longer remain at the scene of the event, but are documented and distributed rapidly with the goal of reaching audiences far wider than the direct victims, to increase terror among the public, and to recruit new activists.
For decades, organized crime was perceived as a problem occurring far from the public eye: in alleys, in secret deals, and in settling scores under the radar. In recent years, against the backdrop of the rise in technology use, a central arena of action has been added to it — that of social networks. In an era where every person has a smartphone with a camera, it can be said with certainty that shooting, an explosive device, or arson no longer remain at the scene of the event. They are documented, edited, and distributed rapidly, thereby becoming a media show intended to reach audiences far wider than the direct victims in order to increase terror among the public and recruit new activists.
In the digital space, which has long since become a central environment of human existence, the power of criminal organizations is not measured only by weapons, money, or the number of people who obey them. It is also measured by their ability to control public attention. For one shooting video may deter witnesses, threaten business owners, frighten elected officials, and instill a sense of helplessness in an entire community — all in one package that has become an especially profitable deal for criminal and terrorist organizations alike. Violence thus becomes a message: beyond the mere existence of physical damage, one that shapes a consciousness according to which the criminal organization is present everywhere and in every space while the state, or governance, is absent from it.
Due to the architectural structure of social networks, digital platforms are not just a neutral conduit for conveying this message. The algorithms operating the recommendation systems for viewing by users tend to grant increased visibility to content that attracts attention and generates high engagement. Among these, videos that arouse fear, shock, anger, or curiosity rise in the algorithmic content monitoring networks, which in turn cause users to linger, watch, react, and share. Thus an amplification cycle is created: the criminal organization produces the show, the users distribute it, and the algorithm grants it additional visibility. A local criminal event receives in this way a psychological and public impact that exceeds by far its place of occurrence.
Media Responsibility and the Shin Bet
News media also has a responsibility within this cycle. Reporting on crime is essential to the public, but repeated presentation of shooting videos, threats, and symbols of power — especially without critical context — may replicate the message that the criminals sought to distribute in the first place. The question is not whether to report, but how to report: and in particular, does the coverage place at the center the imagined power of the criminal, or the harm to the victims, the community, and the rule of law? At the present time, it seems that certain media bodies are becoming, even if unintentionally, force multipliers for criminal organizations.
Understanding this chain of influence is also essential for the discussion on the authorization of the Shin Bet to act against this threat: since the challenge requires dealing with the digital, financial, and consciousness infrastructure that expands the power of the organizations. When a criminal organization activates an explosive device in the heart of a residential neighborhood, documents shooting at a public institution, or distributes designed threat videos, the goal is not only physical harm, but it is a planned psychological attack on the collective public consciousness. This is consciousness-digital terror: creating an effect of horror intended to paralyze the community, prevent cooperation with law enforcement authorities, deter witnesses, threaten judges and elected officials, and establish a status of an "alternative sovereign". Content becomes power, and power becomes a tool for subduing the state.
Technological Axes of Action
In order for the Shin Bet and the Israel Police to be able to deal properly with the challenge, it is important to take into account the technological and communication capabilities of these organizations. Modern criminal organizations manage advanced digital systems: from managing financial empires in encrypted networks and decentralized currencies, through the use of spyware and covert communication, to hostile takeover of local government through digital campaigns of extortion and threats. The tools currently available to the Israel Police do not always provide a full response to the cyber, encryption, and consciousness warfare capabilities of criminal organizations. Here exactly enters the role of the Shin Bet — not as a "super-police" performing arrests in the streets, but as an intelligence and technological accelerator operating with surgical focus. Several steps are required especially at the present time, while focusing on three technological axes:
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Neutralizing consciousness terror in the networks. As the state fights incitement to terror, it must act decisively to cut the viral distribution chain of organized crime. It is necessary to activate fast technological and legal mechanisms that will obligate digital platforms to remove this content, block recurring accounts used by criminal organizations, and act against coordinated distribution networks and recommendation mechanisms.
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Dismantling the technological and financial envelope. The capital driving the organizations is transferred in cryptographic networks, digital wallets, and international shadow systems that intersect with the funding routes of terrorist organizations. The cyber intelligence capabilities of the Shin Bet may complement the capabilities of the police and assist in penetrating these envelopes, in order to harm liquidity and disintegrate the organizational structure of organized crime.
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Cyber-prevention of harm to governance. The penetration of criminal organizations into local authorities and the extortion of elected officials are managed today by media and digital means. Monitoring and preventing these threats to the institutions of the democratic regime are a direct mandate anchored in the Shin Bet law.
Introducing cyber tools and intelligence prevention into the civilian space poses a dire danger of harming human rights. Therefore, the operation of offensive cyber capabilities must be conditioned on rigid statutory caveats: a judicial order in advance from a Supreme Court judge or a district president, a sweeping prohibition on mass collection ("evidence fishing"), and automatic deletion by law of incidental information. This is in order to avoid a situation in which we turn the State of Israel into a panopticon of mass surveillance.
Organized crime is no longer fighting us only with guns — it is fighting us through our consciousness. Combining the cyber and intelligence capabilities of the Shin Bet is a necessity of reality, but only under close supervision and surgical focus in the digital and consciousness arena will we be able to dismantle criminal organizations — and protect the democratic resilience of the State of Israel.
Dr. Alonit Bar-On is the Deputy Head of the Multidisciplinary Department at the Academic College of Safed. Prof. Mohammad Wattad is a full professor (law), President of the Academic College of Ramat Gan. Dr. Tal Mimran is a faculty member at the Academic College of Safed and a senior research fellow at the Tachlit Institute.
