Will Anonymous' intervention weaken the Islamic State group or strengthen it?

[caprichoso]

By Jarvis Deberry
NOLA

What's the better strategy for combating the Islamic State group? Is it better to let its operatives continue to have an online presence and thus recruit more gullible people? Or is it better to shut down their online presence? That second approach might reduce its number of recruits, but there is some concern that it would also make tracking ISIS leadership more difficult.

To use a football analogy: Do you focus your energy on rushing the passer and getting to him before he can pass the ball or do you drop back in the hopes of snagging an interception? What if you don't get that interception and a message gets through that activates a previously dormant terror cell?

These questions are important now because Anonymous, the group of so-called hactivists, have claimed to have shut down more than 5,500 Twitter accounts associated with the Islamic State group. This, apparently, is just the beginning. Anonymous could also shut down other digital accounts operated by members of the Islamic State group.

http://www.nola.com/opinions/index.ssf/2015/11/anonymous_islamic_state.html

[zalinda]

1. This is really a difficult question

In a perfect world, they could choose a trusted go-between to tell the government what is happening. But, the big question is who to trust in government. Every government outlet is so corrupt, you can't tell the good guys from the bad, and that is so sad.

Z

[Chan790]

2. The second and it's an easy choice.

It doesn't make tracking Daesh leadership more difficult, but actually easier because they can't choose to not communicate so they're forced to choose to communicate in ways they'd prefer not to.

It makes it easier both because it pushes them to have to use ad hoc communication means that are often less-secure than the one's they are being denied and because one can protect communication channels you have compromised meaning you can funnel their communications through pathways you can read. (As good as Anonymous is...they're not going to succeed to take down for more than a few minutes at most a page or account that the NSA/CIA has compromised and wants up to be able to monitor or use to feed bad intel or communications.)