A police officer and sniffer dog checks flowers in front of the Notre Dame basilica in Nice, France. Getty
A police officer and sniffer dog checks flowers in front of the Notre Dame basilica in Nice, France. Getty
A police officer and sniffer dog checks flowers in front of the Notre Dame basilica in Nice, France. Getty
A police officer and sniffer dog checks flowers in front of the Notre Dame basilica in Nice, France. Getty

ISIS turns to social media platform Rocket Chat to celebrate France terrorist attacks


Nicky Harley
  • English
  • Arabic

ISIS supporters have used the social media platform Rocket Chat to celebrate the terrorist atrocities in Nice, which left three people dead.

Researchers at the Counter Extremism Project (CEP) think tank said they had monitored Rocket Chat media pages in the aftermath of the attacks last week and discovered posts showing bodies of the victims, two of whom were partially beheaded in the attack at a church.

Rocket Chat uses its own servers, which allows users to administer their own social-media networks.

The CEP found ISIS supporters shared images of the Nice attacker, Brahim Aioussaoi, and a video allegedly showing emergency personnel recovering a body.

There were also further posts calling for the group’s supporters to renew their pledge to its leader.

Rocket Chat is insulated from outside attack, “which means that it's a place where conversations and content can be really interesting,” said Charlie Winter, of the International Centre for the Study of Radicalisation at King’s College London.

“There will be further evolution and innovation in the next six months to a year as ISIS tries to figure out a new more sustainable model.

“The platform that ISIS will be using in six months’ time might not yet exist."

Last year, a report by Europol said ISIS has been turning to the "decentralised web" to find new sites after a crackdown by Facebook, Twitter and Telegram.

It had been dominant on Telegram until the platform deleted thousands of its accounts.

"The decentralised web gives users more say about where their data is stored, avoiding reliance on the big internet gatekeepers like Google and Facebook," author Peter King said in the report, titled IS Group’s Experiments with the Decentralised Web.

"Decentralised platforms like Rocket Chat and ZeroNet have proved attractive for ISIS media operatives, as the developers of those platforms have no way of acting against content that is stored on user-operated servers or dispersed across the user community.

"This contrasts with social media giants like Facebook and Twitter and messaging apps like Telegram – all with centralised data stores – which actively target content and accounts associated with [extremists]."

The paper was released at the European Counter-Terrorism Centre advisory network, at Europol’s headquarters in The Hague.

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TV: World Cup Qualifier 2018 matches will be aired on on OSN Sports HD Cricket channel

Itcan profile

Founders: Mansour Althani and Abdullah Althani

Based: Business Bay, with offices in Saudi Arabia, Egypt and India

Sector: Technology, digital marketing and e-commerce

Size: 70 employees 

Revenue: On track to make Dh100 million in revenue this year since its 2015 launch

Funding: Self-funded to date

 

INFO

What: DP World Tour Championship
When: November 21-24
Where: Jumeirah Golf Estates, Dubai
Tickets: www.ticketmaster.ae.

Fight card

1. Featherweight 66kg: Ben Lucas (AUS) v Ibrahim Kendil (EGY)

2. Lightweight 70kg: Mohammed Kareem Aljnan (SYR) v Alphonse Besala (CMR)

3. Welterweight 77kg:Marcos Costa (BRA) v Abdelhakim Wahid (MAR)

4. Lightweight 70kg: Omar Ramadan (EGY) v Abdimitalipov Atabek (KGZ)

5. Featherweight 66kg: Ahmed Al Darmaki (UAE) v Kagimu Kigga (UGA)

6. Catchweight 85kg: Ibrahim El Sawi (EGY) v Iuri Fraga (BRA)

7. Featherweight 66kg: Yousef Al Husani (UAE) v Mohamed Allam (EGY)

8. Catchweight 73kg: Mostafa Radi (PAL) v Ahmed Abdelraouf of Egypt (EGY)

9.  Featherweight 66kg: Jaures Dea (CMR) v Andre Pinheiro (BRA)

10. Catchweight 90kg: Tarek Suleiman (SYR) v Juscelino Ferreira (BRA)

MATCH INFO

Real Madrid 3 (Kroos 4', Ramos 30', Marcelo 37')

Eibar 1 (Bigas 60')

Pakistan v New Zealand Test series

Pakistan: Sarfraz (c), Hafeez, Imam, Azhar, Sohail, Shafiq, Azam, Saad, Yasir, Asif, Abbas, Hassan, Afridi, Ashraf, Hamza

New Zealand: Williamson (c), Blundell, Boult, De Grandhomme, Henry, Latham, Nicholls, Ajaz, Raval, Sodhi, Somerville, Southee, Taylor, Wagner

Umpires: Bruce Oxerford (AUS) and Ian Gould (ENG); TV umpire: Paul Reiffel (AUS); Match referee: David Boon (AUS)

Tickets and schedule: Entry is free for all spectators. Gates open at 9am. Play commences at 10am

Specs

Engine: 51.5kW electric motor

Range: 400km

Power: 134bhp

Torque: 175Nm

Price: From Dh98,800

Available: Now

In numbers

- Number of children under five will fall from 681 million in 2017 to 401m in 2100

- Over-80s will rise from 141m in 2017 to 866m in 2100

- Nigeria will become the world’s second most populous country with 791m by 2100, behind India

- China will fall dramatically from a peak of 2.4 billion in 2024 to 732 million by 2100

- an average of 2.1 children per woman is required to sustain population growth

FIXTURES

All games 6pm UAE on Sunday: 
Arsenal v Watford
Burnley v Brighton
Chelsea v Wolves
Crystal Palace v Tottenham
Everton v Bournemouth
Leicester v Man United
Man City v Norwich
Newcastle v Liverpool
Southampton v Sheffield United
West Ham v Aston Villa

The Buckingham Murders

Starring: Kareena Kapoor Khan, Ash Tandon, Prabhleen Sandhu

Director: Hansal Mehta

Rating: 4 / 5

THE BIO

Bio Box

Role Model: Sheikh Zayed, God bless his soul

Favorite book: Zayed Biography of the leader

Favorite quote: To be or not to be, that is the question, from William Shakespeare's Hamlet

Favorite food: seafood

Favorite place to travel: Lebanon

Favorite movie: Braveheart

French business

France has organised a delegation of leading businesses to travel to Syria. The group was led by French shipping giant CMA CGM, which struck a 30-year contract in May with the Syrian government to develop and run Latakia port. Also present were water and waste management company Suez, defence multinational Thales, and Ellipse Group, which is currently looking into rehabilitating Syrian hospitals.

MATCH INFO

Liverpool 4 (Salah (pen 4, 33', & pen 88', Van Dijk (20')

Leeds United 3 (Harrison 12', Bamford 30', Klich 66')

Man of the match Mohamed Salah (Liverpool)

How will Gen Alpha invest?

Mark Chahwan, co-founder and chief executive of robo-advisory firm Sarwa, forecasts that Generation Alpha (born between 2010 and 2024) will start investing in their teenage years and therefore benefit from compound interest.

“Technology and education should be the main drivers to make this happen, whether it’s investing in a few clicks or their schools/parents stepping up their personal finance education skills,” he adds.

Mr Chahwan says younger generations have a higher capacity to take on risk, but for some their appetite can be more cautious because they are investing for the first time. “Schools still do not teach personal finance and stock market investing, so a lot of the learning journey can feel daunting and intimidating,” he says.

He advises millennials to not always start with an aggressive portfolio even if they can afford to take risks. “We always advise to work your way up to your risk capacity, that way you experience volatility and get used to it. Given the higher risk capacity for the younger generations, stocks are a favourite,” says Mr Chahwan.

Highlighting the role technology has played in encouraging millennials and Gen Z to invest, he says: “They were often excluded, but with lower account minimums ... a customer with $1,000 [Dh3,672] in their account has their money working for them just as hard as the portfolio of a high get-worth individual.”

Friday’s fixture

6.15pm: Al Wahda v Hatta

6.15pm: Al Dhafra v Ajman

9pm: Al Wasl v Baniyas

9pm: Fujairah v Sharjah

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