All Things Counter Terrorism

I’ve had a lot of people ask  whether I plan to put out something formally on my “edge of network connections” theory and how it relates to terrorism . Short answer is yes. But not just yet.

First, it’s part of the thesis which must come well,  first. Second I want to fully unpack how I used it both in terms of my study and in my work at the AFP (as best I can using open source data), but to do so I need to wait until some trials are over. So hang tight on that. Once they are over and thesis is done I will get to it. And try to put it out formally if I can.

But by means of background for those of you interested, the idea of “edge of network connections” came to me many years ago when I was first interested in building a framework for my thesis that could be used in database solutions and in particular for mining un-structured data.

I’m still hoping to build that framework, but my thesis took a little detour into the world of doctrine so that will have to be a post thesis pull together.

But anyway, I’ve been fascinated by concept searching software, database mining, networks, ontologies and how it all comes together for many years. Lucky for me when I went into the AFP, the boys in this area were nice enough to humour me and teach me. And here we have the convergence from the IT stuff of “edge of networks” and into terrorism “edge of network connections”. I sort of got an idea from the computer stuff that I then worked with for my thesis. And I also thought it might have some applications in intelligence work. This idea was “edge of network connections” because in my study I kept seeing the same thing come up. And then of course with work I got to see more of the picture, which confirmed what I thought.

And then I got so interested that I ended up being on a working group that I subsequently chaired on Convergence Software. Basically it was a forward looking group that examined what intelligence solutions we would need to fully live up to our mantra of  intelligence led policing.   By that stage my  dear friend (who is the best analyst I have ever worked with and remains to this day my mentor in all things ct) and I had started our own project on green fields targeting (her idea) coupled with my idea (edge of network connections). It was a massive project as those analysts out there I am sure could appreciate. First we had to get the data, and confirm it was correct because one great thing about databases is everything is there. One bad thing about databases is that everything is there. So you have to sort out the wheat from the grass and make sure your data set is clean and accurate before you even get to the good stuff. And then you have to repeat each time you add new data.

Anyway, we were doing this manually (well sort of) with analysts notebook (yes it took months!). A great charting tool, but not good for network analysis (or social network analysis, although I know some purists have issues with us analysts co-opting that term for what we do). Anyway, we were half way through that when we got some tools to try and things really started to take off and we really started to see some good things happen. As I said I need to wait before I can explain that more fully. But the bottom line was that we were able to predict future cell members and we successfully did so. Pretty exciting stuff.

So I sat on the idea which came from the thesis stuff originally because it had more immediate applications at work. But now I’m not at work and I’m again looking at data like that from London ( transatlantic plots, 07/05 attacks, operation crevice), I think it is time to really unpack this and do some research that I hope will not only help us understand more fully “edge of network connections” and how they play into radicalisation trajectories and terrorist plots  but also for software solutions.  Won’t be perfect but it might be a start. So there you have it. Now I need to go do some work so this stupid thesis gets finished or my supervisors will kill me.