SEARCCT, the Government of Japan, and the United Nations Office of Counter-Terrorism (UNCCT) co-organised a workshop entitled Enhancing the Skills of Officials in Relation to the Exploitations of Social Media and the Internet to Counter the Foreign Terrorist Fighters Phenomenon and Violent Extremism in Kuala Lumpur from 26 to 27 August 2019. Twenty-one local officials attended the programme and Mr. Chuah Teong Ban, Director-General of SEARCCT, did the opening.
The workshop addressed five main issues namely, the evolving FTF phenomenon; the use of Social Media by FTFs; gender and human rights; national strategies and good practices to counter the use of internet for radicalization; and investigation and evidence collection.
The speakers were from UNCCT, UNCTED, UNODC, Vietnam Police Academy, and SEARCCT. There were several issues discussed and the participants actively exchanged their views on gaps, challenges, and the improvement of existing national strategies. There was also a session that allowed participants to share their future training needs. Participants suggested new topics that could be included in similar future programmes such as Artificial Intelligence Technologies in Counter-Terrorism, Cyber Terrorist target selections, OSINT for prosecutors and judges, protection of cyberspace at international events as well as Public-Private Partnerships and Risk Management in counter-terrorism.