FAQ

Our research at Tech Against Terrorism shows that small platforms are in urgent need of support in understanding the threat to their services as well as building pragmatic ways to moderate terrorist content effectively.

Currently, smaller platforms have to look to various places and sources to inform their policies and content moderation decisions. The Knowledge Sharing Platform (KSP) is a “one stop shop” for Trust & Safety and content moderation teams, offering all the resources needed to strengthen their counterterrorism policies and enforcement mechanisms, as well as support their efforts to increase transparency and accountability.

All tech companies will be eligible for access to the KSP. Each company registering will be given access for an unlimited number of users across different teams to the platform. All users registering for the KSP will be vetted by Tech Against Terrorism.

Smaller tech companies are given priority for access. We will additionally consider trusted stakeholders from academia, civil society, and government on a case-by-case basis.

Registration does not guarantee admission. Tech Against Terrorism reserves the right to reject access in line with organisational policy around admission.

The KSP has been developed to support small platforms; however, there are elements that will be of benefit to governments as well. We will therefore consider government access on a case-by-case basis. Everyone accessing the platform will undergo a vetting procedure.

All of Tech Against Terrorism’s mentee and member companies, as well as any other tech platforms that have registered, who have been vetted and approved by Tech Against Terrorism will be able to access and use the KSP.

The KSP will be free to use and access.

The KSP has been funded by the UK Home Office.

The UK Home Office has had no influence on the formation of the platform or any of its policies

The only information we will collect from individual users are their name, email address, job title and organisation. We have developed the KSP in line with relevant data protection laws and privacy considerations

The KSP resources will alleviate the burden that content moderators and Trust & Safety teams at smaller platforms face when responding to terrorist content and activity.

Though there are many resources available online for understanding the terrorist threat landscape, online regulation, and human rights, they are difficult for tech companies to locate and often accompanied with little analysis.

The KSP collates and organises all relevant and reliable information into analytical research and actionable guidelines, providing a learning hub with practical policy and enforcement recommendations for smaller platforms.

Tech Against Terrorism will do a qualitative assessment to ensure that platforms and their teams are finding the KSP resources useful, and regularly contact users to develop the platform further to their needs.

Our symbols compendium and the terminology dataset only includes designated terrorist groups. These groups span the ideological spectrum, including far-right, far-left, and Islamist terrorist groups.

The KSP is grounded in the rule of law and therefore follows the legal designation of terrorist groups by democratic nation states and supranational institutions. This policy is in line with our Terrorist Content Analytics Platform Group Inclusion Policy, which can be found here.

Most of the groups included in the KSP fall under the proscribed listings of the European Union, United Nations, United Kingdom, and United States.

At Tech Against Terrorism, we call for improved designation of terrorist groups so that all terrorist threats online are covered by international law. As groups are designated, we will review and amend the KSP Inclusion Policy accordingly.

When developing the KSP, Tech Against Terrorism has focused on the needs of smaller tech companies, in particular ensuring that all information and analysis of the evolving threat and regulatory landscapes remains up-to-date.

All of Tech Against Terrorism’s work with smaller platforms, including the guidelines and resources provided, is underpinned by its commitment to meaningful transparency and accountability from the tech sector.

To ensure we are meeting the needs of tech companies and to tailor the KSP accordingly, we have gathered feedback from a group of beta users including Eventbrite, JustPaste.it, Ask.fm, as well as other TAT mentees and members. The platforms included in this beta user group varied in many aspects, such as type of service, user base size, and content moderation approaches.

Following initial insights and feedback from our beta users, we have implemented changes and made updates to the platform ahead of its launch. In addition to our beta users, Tech Against Terrorism has mentored 25 tech platforms since 2018 to help them tackle terrorist use of their platforms whilst respecting human rights and freedom of speech. We have developed the KSP and its resources based on an approach to respond to the tech sector’s counterterrorism needs.

Since the KSP has been created for platforms at varying stages of their development process, we are conscious that different platforms will have different needs. This will include platforms in early stages of their counterterrorism content standards policies, content moderation enforcement or transparency efforts, or TAT mentorship/membership process.

The KSP will also support platforms across the platform economy, from social media and video-sharing services to “sharing-economy” platforms, each with their own content moderation approach. Our mentees all face different threats in terms of terrorist and violent extremist groups attempting to exploit their services: we therefore aim to ensure that the KSP remains relevant for platforms in their various development stages.

Finally, we aim to keep up with the evolving threat and regulatory landscapes by maintaining the platform’s resources and continuously expanding upon them.

We opened early registrations and provided demos for a group of beta users, consisting of some of TAT’s mentees and members whose platforms range in type and size. This beta user group provided us with early-stage feedback to implement and guide relevant changes before launching the platform. We will also allow civil society groups and experts access to assess the content on the platform.

Tech Against Terrorism works with a broad range of stakeholders to build on our understanding of the threat and evolving counterterrorism practices. The different insights and best practice protocols we gather from our extensive networks, as well as our subject matter expertise, are used to inform our policy and practical support to tech companies, which includes all resources included in the KSP. The resources included in the KSP are based on materials created by trustworthy third-party expert organisations.

To help guide platforms with trusted sources for their research and review, the KSP includes a section dedicated to trusted external academic research and other initiatives covering terrorist use of the internet, tech policy, online regulation, and human rights.

As per the Knowledge Sharing Platform’s Terms of Usage, all KSP materials may not be distributed.