The Mayor of London, Sadiq Khan, has today launched a new smartphone app to make it easier for Londoners to report terrorist content online.
Research commissioned by City Hall found four out of five Londoners were unsure how to report extremist material from internet search engines during the pandemic.
The iREPORTit app has been funded by £40,000 of City Hall investment and created in partnership with the national Counter Terrorism Internet Referral Unit. It will enable Londoners and people across the country to report terrorist content online quickly, easily and anonymously to the police using their smartphone.
The new app recognises that we all have a part to play in rooting out terrorist material online. The app is free to download now on Android and Apple devices and allows users to flag any terrorist content online or on social media in three quick and easy steps. The anonymous reports will go directly to the national Counter Terrorism Internet Referral Unit (CTIRU), which has successfully sought the removal of hundreds of thousands of links to terrorist material and assisted more than 500 counter terrorism investigations nationally in the last two years.
The iREPORTit app has been created at a time when there has never been a greater risk of online radicalisation. Lockdown restrictions mean Londoners are spending more time than ever online at home, away from traditional protective role models such as teachers, friends and family, faith communities and other support networks. The Coronavirus pandemic has seen a rise in online disinformation which has been used by extremists of all persuasions to promote hate and violence. The attacks last year in Reading and Streatham, alongside multiple plots foiled by the police and security services, have also proved that terrorism is still a real threat to our communities.
The Mayor’s funding of the mobile app, which will initially run as a three-month pilot, is on top of the £6m he has already invested in supporting victims and tackling all forms of hate. This is the latest phase of his Countering Violent Extremism (CVE) programme which has already invested £800,000 in more than 30 civil society-led projects across the capital, bringing the total investment in countering extremism to significantly more than that made by any other Mayor.
The iREPORTit App was created after the Mayor’s CVE programme commissioned research to better understand attitudes to terrorism and extremism across the capital and why Londoners were hesitant to refer such material they came across online.
Research during the second wave of the pandemic found whilst nearly three quarters of Londoners (74 per cent) believe that social media companies should be doing more to combat extremism on their sites, less than half knew how to get it removed from those sites (42 per cent). It also found that 81 per cent of all Londoners either would not know or were unsure how to get online extremist material taken down from popular internet search engines.2
In response to these findings, City Hall delivered its first ever CVE Mayor’s Civic Innovation Challenge which asked London’s leading tech sector to come up with an innovative solution to help reduce terrorist content online and make it simpler for members of the public to report terrorist content anonymously from their smartphones.4 Raven Science won the challenge and was awarded £40,000 to create the iREPORTit app.
The Mayor of London, Sadiq Khan, said: “We know terrorists and extremists are set on exploiting the uncertainty and anxiety caused by the pandemic for their own gain. With more people than ever online for longer periods, often at home alone or in isolated environments, I’m determined to do everything I can to counter that threat and help keep Londoners safe.
“Working closely with the national Counter Terrorism Internet Referral Unit, I have funded the iREPORTit app to make it easier for people to report extremist content quickly and anonymously from their mobile phone.
“We know terrorism does not recognise borders so this app will be available to all Londoners and everyone across the UK. However, we urgently need the Government and tech firms to step up and do more now to prevent the rapid spread of terrorist and extremism material online. Insidious voices are growing louder online, and we must all work together to counter hate, intolerance, extremism and terrorism.”
If you have seen material online which you are concerned could be terrorist or extremist, you can also report it at www.gov.uk/act
Assistant Commissioner Neil Basu, head of Counter Terrorism Policing, said: “Every time a member of public sends the Counter Terrorism Internet Referral Unit a link to material which is terrorist or extremist in nature, they are helping police in the international fight against terrorism.
“So I welcome this new app which offers the public another way to report material, in addition to the existing reporting tools.
“Specialist officers are ready and waiting to look at each and every single referral sent via the app.
“Where material breaches UK terrorism legislation, they will seek its removal, even if the website host is based in another country, because every piece that is removed from the Internet is no longer out in the ether, potentially radicalising vulnerable people and encouraging them to cause serious harm to others.”
Hadiya Masieh, Chair of London Counter Terrorism Advisory Group and founder of the Groundswell Project, said: “In 2014 when DAESH began to groom and recruit scores of vulnerable young people on almost all social media platforms, it was a shock to our system and our communities felt helpless. Apps like iREPORTit will ultimately help us to safeguard our children and protect the UK from all forms of extremism and terrorism. By providing a safe and anonymous way to refer disturbing content, we can protect our communities and give worried individuals peace of mind.”
Raven Science, Developers of the iREPORTit app, said: "We are thrilled to have developed the iREPORTit app, in partnership with MOPAC and the Counter Terrorism Internet Referral Unit (CTIRU). Raven Science is a team of cyber security experts whose mission is to make the world safer by improving online security. Having worked on counter extremism for several years, the opportunity to collaborate with MOPAC and the CTIRU on this project has been great. We believe that the app we have developed can really empower the public when reporting worrying or disturbing content they have found online. We have designed the app to be easy to use, confidential, and anonymous. Users can be assured that no personally identifiable information is collected by the app or anywhere in the network, and reports are seen only by the CTIRU. We cannot wait for the public to start using it."
Nigel Bromage, Founder of EXIT UK and former Far Right Extremist, said: “Reporting extremism & extremist material is so important, especially now when people are more than ever in danger of coming into contact with extremist content online. As extremists from all corners seek to promote their message of division and hate, its crucial such content is minimised to protect individuals and our society, which we all cherish. The iREPORTit app is a great initiative and shows how all of us can do something to reduce the influence of extremism. By all of us working together this helps not just to reduce extremism, but also shows that we won’t accept violent extremists operating and recruiting online. We can’t recommend the iREPORTit app enough.”