By  Nora Beauvais

This is the OECD’s fourth benchmarking report examining the policies and procedures related to terrorist and violent extremist content (TVEC) online, with a focus on transparency reporting, of the world’s top 50 most popular online content-sharing services (the “popular services”). Like the third edition, this report also covers the 50 online content-sharing services that terrorist and violent extremist groups and their supporters exploit or rely upon the most (the “intensive services”). The first three reports provided a benchmark against which this fourth report assesses relevant developments. Terrorist and violent extremist actors continually adapt their methods to technological developments. As governments and online platforms increasingly take measures to curb the dissemination of TVEC, terrorists and violent extremists make adjustments to avoid content moderation. On mainstream online platforms, for example, they have been developing tactics to evade automated detection tools. Meanwhile, sustained efforts by large platforms to combat TVEC have also caused a “displacement effect” whereby terrorists and violent extremists turn to alternatives (e.g. cloud platform websites, decentralised web technology, niche alt-platforms, and terrorist-operated websites). Transparency reporting on TVEC online is crucial to assess the evolution and magnitude of the threat, evaluate the effectiveness and efficiency of online platforms’ policies and actions to tackle this problem, as well as their impact on human rights, and build an evidence base to support policymaking and regulatory frameworks. The key findings of this report are: 1. The popular and intensive services are more diverse, both ideologically and geographically. The TVEC landscape is multi-faceted, encompassing a wide range of ideologies, from terrorist groups to violent extremist political movements and lone actors, and it is spreading across different types of contentsharing services and geographical regions. For the first time in this report series, the popular services’ list includes a gaming service. This is noteworthy because gaming services are increasingly used by terrorist and violent extremist actors. In addition, three Indian platforms have joined this ranking. As for the intensive services’ list, it features a self-proclaimed anarchist website for the first time and covers a wider spectrum of geographic regions and languages.2. Overlap between the popular and intensive services remains low, highlighting the need to look at the TVEC landscape more comprehensively. Only ten services appear on both the popular and intensive lists, compared to 11 in the third benchmarking report. However, many policy discussions and responses still tend to focus on the largest platforms. Paired with the finding that the intensive services tend to be less transparent than the popular services (see below), the takeaway is that neglecting smaller but intensive services risks under-scrutinising or even turning a blind eye to a core part of the problem.3. The evidence shows mixed results regarding the clarity of the popular services popular services’ definitions of TVEC, while most of the intensive services’ still do not define or even expressly prohibit TVEC. On the one hand, the definitions related to TVEC in the popular services’ policies and procedures are, overall, clearer than in the previous report. Services are using more comprehensive descriptions of TVEC and related concepts, but new gaps among the services’ approaches have emerged, with a proportion of them still using vague terminology (18%) or having become less precise. On the other hand, 60% of the intensive services still do not define or explicitly prohibit TVEC, or they simply have not established any governing documents. 4. Transparency reporting on TVEC reveals new gaps among popular services and remains rare among intensive services. Seventeen of the popular services now issue transparency reports with specific information on TVEC, as compared to just five in the first edition, 11 in the second, and 15 in the third of this series. This represents the slowest year-to-year growth rate to date. For the first time in the series, one of the services (present on both the popular and the intensive services lists) that previously issued transparency reports with TVECspecific information ceased this practice. In addition, three of the four newest Services to issue transparency reports on TVEC provide very limited information, both quantitatively and qualitatively. Furthermore, there is still significant heterogeneity among the popular services’ reporting approaches, which continues to make data aggregation and cross-platform comparisons difficult, if not impossible. Among the intensive services, only six issue transparency reports on their policies and actions concerning TVEC, against 8 previously, and the vast majority (5 of 6) also appear in the popular services list. The scarcity in transparency reporting on TVEC among the intensive services may be explained by the fact that many of them are operated by terrorist and violent extremist groups and supporters, or by free speech “absolutists” who deliberately let TVEC flourish on their platforms. 5. Content moderation approaches continue to pose risks for privacy, freedom of expression and due process. Continuing a trend that began during the COVID-19 pandemic, popular services rely more heavily on automated tools to detect and remove TVEC, which has generally increased the removal of lawful content and unjustified censorship. Furthermore, half of the intensive services remain opaque regarding their approaches to content moderation; and most of them either have no notifications and appeal mechanisms in place, or do not provide any information in this regard. This raises questions regarding their efforts to ensure the respect of privacy, freedom of expression and due process.6. New online safety laws and regulations are creating an increasingly fragmented transparency reporting landscape. As new online safety laws and regulations come into force, content-sharing services are facing new obligations to issue transparency reports in multiple jurisdictions, and they face different reporting requirements in each of them. To conclude, this report highlights the need for more precision in the Services’ governing documents; more consistency in the metrics and methodologies used to prepare transparency reports; more transparency in their content moderation approaches; and more efforts to ensure due process and to safeguard human rights and fundamental freedoms.

By Mia Doolan,  Katie Cox,  Kiran M. Sarma

This is the protocol for a Campbell Systematic Review. This review will address two aims: (1) A qualitative synthesis ofliterature on the composition of online far right propaganda, and (2) A quantitative synthesis of literature examining the impactof exposure to online far‐right propaganda on audiences. These syntheses will be guided by the following specific objectives: (i)What is the content (i.e. themes) of online far‐right propaganda, and how does this differ across ideological subgroups? (ii) What is the structure of online far‐right propaganda, and how does this differ across ideological subgroups? (iii) What is the context ofthese messages (i.e., where, when and by whom were they posted?) (iv) What impact does exposure to online far‐rightpropaganda have on audiences with reference to the radicalisation of opinion and/or action.

Campbell Systematic Reviews Volume 21, Issue 4 Dec 2025

By Bibi van Ginkel, Tanya Mehra, Merlina Herbach, Julian Lanchès, and Yael Boerma

This study examines a pressing and highly topical challenge: how to assess online content that may undermine democracy, threaten national security and public safety, or infringe upon the rights of others—while safeguarding freedom of expression. The central question it explores, the specific challenges identified, and the recommendations it puts forward should not be viewed in a vacuum. Rather, they are situated within a broader and increasingly complex societal and political context. A range of systemic developments shapes the environment in which this work takes place: the rise of online radicalisation, particularly among children and young adults; the expanding influence of large technology platforms and the tensions this creates with rule-of-law-based democratic societies leading to a global trend toward both techno-libertarianism and techno-authoritarianism; and the evolving role of governments as they seek to reconcile the imperatives of security, safety, and national interest with those of privacy, human rights, and minority protection. These challenges are compounded by the unprecedented speed and scale of online information dissemination, growing concerns about disinformation and foreign influence, and the urgent need to strengthen societal resilience and media literacy. While this study does not address each of these systemic issues in depth, they form the essential backdrop against which its findings and proposals should be understood.

The Hague: The International Centre for Counter-Terrorism (ICCT), 2025. 208p.

By Marco Romagna & Rutger E. Leukfeldt

Hacktivism is a rising phenomenon in the cyber landscape combining elements of the hacking subculture with ideologically motivated agendas inspired both by traditional activism and by new elements of the digital culture. Despite several studies on the topic, it is still not completely clear what motivates an individual to engage in this type of collective action and if the reasons can be compared to what is already known for more traditional forms of social protests. Taking a socio-psychological approach, this study uses the social identity model of collective action (SIMCA) as a theoretical lens to analyze hacktivists’ motives and engagement process. The analysis is based on 28 semi-structured interviews, and it considers the four main elements of the model, naming: morality, social identity, perceived injustice and perceived efficacy. The violation of moral values seems to be the main trigger to participate in the action, while social identity plays an important role both as the second step in the engagement process and as a bridge with the other elements of the model. The results seem to be in line with what is already known for other forms of social protests, although some elements of the model provide new means of interpretation.

JOURNAL OF CRIME AND JUSTICE 2024, VOL. 47, NO. 4, 511–529

Aims

This review seeks to synthesise existing research on transnational mechanisms and processes to provide insights into the factors that shape protest-extremism dynamics to address the following primary research questions::

1. What increases the vulnerability of protest mobilisations to transnational actors (states, violent movements, individuals) promoting violence across borders?

2. What factors constrain the potential for violence, radicalisation, and terrorism in transnational social movements/ mobilisations?

3. Under what conditions do alliances between social movements and international actors lead to an increased potential for violence? What characteristics of both types of actors contribute to this dynamic?

4. What are the mechanisms of influence between transnational and local protest mobilisations?

Methodology 

This research uses a rapid evidence assessment (REA) approach, synthesising knowledge on specific topics in line with the research questions from published journal articles, book chapters, reports, and dissertations, including both academic and “grey” literature (e.g., government and think tank reports).

The REA adopted a streamlined methodology using keyword searches of major social science databases, after which identified documents were screened for inclusion based on pre-determined eligibility criteria.

Key findings 

The literature on both transnational protests and transnational interactions with local movements or protests does not significantly differ from the core findings of the previous two Rapid Evidence Assessments in this series which focused on social movement insights into violent protests (Salman, Marsden, Lewis, 2025) and interdisciplinary research into individual-level processes that shape radicalisation and violence related to protests (Peterscheck, Marsden & Salman, 2025). Earlier findings that remain highly relevant to transnational processes include:

• Movement schism and fragmentation may increase potential for violence.

• Exposure to misinformation influences protest dynamics in ways which can increase the danger of violent escalation.

• The potential for counter-messaging to be counter-productive by producing unintended effects like reinforcing commitment to pre-existing positions, enhancing grievances like perceived discrimination, and reinforcing identities.

• Digital platforms play a role in forging collective identities, including or especially transnational ones.

• Fringe political movements are associated with increased acceptance of political violence.

• Identity fusion, especially in relation to perceived threats against a group, increases the salience of group identity and individual commitment to actions in support or defence of the group, even at cost to the individual.

• Perceptions of existential threats, discrimination, collective angst, and shared grievances can intensify group identity.

The social movement literature has developed a significant body of work on transnational movements. The key insights from the social movement and interdisciplinary literature on violence and protests also help to interpret cross-border influences. Transnational perspectives primarily add another layer of interaction, mutual influence, and opportunities for resource sharing and mobilisation. However, the mediating factors that influence contemporary social movement mobilisations, including new technology and the role of social media and their influence on violence have received less attention. This is particularly the case when violence is informed by local events and dynamics, but is influenced by transnational actors and processes. This suggests a broader gap to be filled by future research on the questions outlined in this report. 

London: CREST, The Centre for Research and Evidence on Security Threats , 2025. 48p.