First came news this week that almost 20% of high school and university students in so-called “moderate” Indonesia support the establishment of a caliphate; now there is an App to support the Islamic State in that country. Indonesia is becoming increasingly sharia-compliant and dangerous, even for tourists.
According to Kiagus Ahmad Badarudin, chairman of the Financial Transaction Reports and Analysis Center (PPATK):
Terror groups now call for donations through social media [and messaging platforms] such as WhatsApp groups or Twitter…..Bitcoin and PayPal are also used to move their money.
Unfortunately, social media giants are aiding jihadists overseas while targeting counter-jihadists in North America, including Jihad Watch, which Paypal tried to ban and Facebook and Twitter have censored.
“Support for Islamic State? In Indonesia, There’s an App for That,” by Resty Woro Yuniar, South China Morning Post (thanks to The Religion of Peace), November 8, 2017:
Robbing banks, dealing drugs, stealing motorcycles – these are the kind of activities popularly associated with the world of terrorist group funding. But to the modern jihadi they’re all a little passé.
ATM smash and grabs, thefts and laundering money from front charities may have been all the rage as recently as 2014, but since 2015 online donations have been the avenue of choice for Islamic State supporting groups hoping to finance attacks in Indonesia, the world’s most populous Muslim-majority nation.
That’s according to a new joint study by the country’s National Counterterrorism Agency, State Intelligence Agency, and Financial Transaction Reports and Analysis Centre (PPATK), which examined the banking transactions involved in terror cases between 2014 and August 2017.
“Terror groups now call for donations through social media [and messaging platforms] such as WhatsApp groups or Twitter,” said Kiagus Ahmad Badarudin, chairman of the PPATK. “Bitcoin and PayPal are also used to move their money.”
Social media appealed to terrorists because it was practical, easy and borderless, Badarudin said. Most donations over social media were small, ranging from US$100-US$1,000, but the flow of aid was continuous and tough to track, he said.
Terror cells were also receiving contributions from legal businesses such as small-scale merchants and phone credit sellers, Badarudin added.
The shift online was, in part, due to a tightening of the net by security services.
“Jemaah Islamiyah in particular used a network of charities to siphon funds for militant operations. Those charities fell under scrutiny by security forces and more or less dried up as a funding source,” said Zachary Abuza, professor at the National War College in Washington, referring to an infamous Southeast Asia-wide jihadist network.
“It is not a surprise that pro-Islamic State groups have turned to social media to make appeals for donations as Islamic State has such a slick and widespread presence across so many different social media platforms.”
Indonesia has clamped down on Islamic extremism in recent months, arresting at least 160 pro-IS militants since the first attack linked to the group in January last year. At the end of October, police arrested nine suspected terrorists in East and Central Java, South Sulawesi, and Riau. In East Java, authorities arrested a man with ties to Bahrun Naim, an Indonesian militant in Syria who masterminded the 2016 Jakarta attacks that killed eight people. The man had been communicating with Naim through the messaging app Telegram, where the pair had belonged to a group called ‘Kulak Tahu’ (tofu seller).
Encrypted messaging platforms such as Telegram and WhatsApp are proving popular not only with active terror cells in Indonesia, but even with militants who are already behind bars. Authorities suspect the services are used by imprisoned terrorists, using mobile phones smuggled into their jails, to propagate their ideologies and even direct attacks from the comfort of their cells.
For this reason, the Indonesian communications ministry in July temporarily blocked web-access to Telegram, rescinding the order only after the company’s CEO Pavel Durov pledged to help the ministry close down radical chat groups.
“Authorities need to be wary of the [usage] of social media because it’s very easy to disseminate bank accounts privately there, making it easy for people to donate,” said Sidney Jones, director of the Institute for Policy Analysis of Conflict in Jakarta.
For their part, tech companies such as Facebook, Twitter, Microsoft, and YouTube have teamed up since December last year to curb the spread of radical content. The companies created a shared industry database of unique digital “fingerprints,” or so-called “hashes”, for terrorism-related images and videos.
“Violent organisations have no place on Facebook, we will take [the radical contents] down when we’re made aware of them,” said Gullnaz Baig, product policy manager at Facebook Asia Pacific.
The clampdown on Facebook targets such groups regardless of what they post.
“If you’re Osama bin Laden and you’re talking about puppies and kittens, we will still take you down because you are Osama bin Laden,” Baig added.
Meanwhile, online payment services such as PayPal and cryptocurrencies are also proving popular with the modern jihadi because they facilitate anonymous payments, according to the PPATK…..
Frank Anderson says
Mortimer, we have been exchanging thoughts for a while on the prospects of encouraging reform; but I think our hope of reform is happening far slower than the progress of those who promote the imposition of sharia. It would be so “nice” if the problem would solve itself. Where from here?
Flavius Claudius Iulianus says
Excuse me for my rude interjection into your dialogue but I just can’t help myself:
You are deceiving yourselves in believing that Mohammadism is ‘reformable.’ Partly to blame for this mistaken view is the successful evolution of other religions. Yes, Christianity and Judaism have changed, evolved and reformed but Mohammadism is not ‘reformable,’ never will be. As you well know, a central tenet of Mohammadism is that Mohammad is the last prophet and his word is the last word. Therefore, any reinterpretation of the literal words of Mohammad is a big no-no. Written directly into the Koran are the words of Allah, “[t]his day I have perfected for you your religion …” To alter what Allah has perfected would be blasphemous. The literal interpretation has always been and will always be considered the ‘strongest’ reading of the Mohammadan scriptures, and therefore will always be deemed the correct reading.
Even if Mohammadism were ‘reformable,’ do you want the West to be involved in no less than five-hundred years of religious wars? (That is the length of time it took Europe to resolve the Catholic-Protestant divide.) And, if I may remind you, Mohammadism has already been engaged in internecine conflicts/war for most of its history.
As soon as you try to reform Mohammadism you begin the process of creating a whole new religion. The landscape of Middle Eastern religions is littered with Mohammadan spin-offs. (Some consider themselves to still be Mohammadan and others no longer.) A brief sampling: the Baha’i faith, the Ahmadis, the Druze, the Ismailis, the Alawites, etc.
And those few Mohammadan reformers that we see are not undertaking any real reforms; they are engaging in “sophisticated taqiyya,” because, in the end, they are all Mohammadan supremacists.
The only effective way to deal with Mohammadism is isolation and defense. Left to their own machinations, isolated Mohammadan societies weaken and shrink, and become less of a threat to the rest of humanity.
Frank Anderson says
Flavius C.I., my thoughts of courtesy require extending sincere hospitality to anyone who wishes to contribute to a conversation. I learned long ago at a 12 year military school, “A wise man harkeneth to counsel; A fool in his own eyes is always right.” I cannot find the exact language in Proverbs that was routinely quoted by the school’s honored Superintendent; but it is not for lack of trying. Your counsel is certainly worth considering in the mess we face.
I have little hope of any wholesale reform of evil. The only hope is that a few here and there will really see what is taught and practiced and sooner or later find it revolting. It seems clear that more are falling in than the few climbing out. Based on his continued advocacy of “absolute deprogramming” which I still do not understand after months of comments, Mortimer from time to time mentions the idea, but still does not offer an explanation that I can understand. I admire many of his posts and find most of them totally agreeable.
I also learned a long time ago and many times and many different ways since that leaving someone else to do my work for me is a perfect formula for disappointment. Our choice is to surrender, resist or die. There does not seem to be many places left to run. The Jews in Nazi Germany had plenty of warning about the evil intentions of their enemies. Half understood and got as far as they could (some not far enough); the other half never got the message and sat there until they rode the trains to the death camps. Hitler wrote Mein Kampf while he was in prison and published it about 1924. His first public speech in about 1920 for the German Workers’ Party, which later became the National Socialist German Workers Party, was about Jews and reasons to dislike them.
Islam has been writing of hatred of infidels and calls to murder them for 1400 years, and many have practiced what is preached, killing more or less 300 million people, about twice the combined total of murders by Hitler, Stalin, Mao, Pol Pot, Idi Amin and any other 20th century mass killer who should be on the list. The aspirational goal is well known to kill literally billions as soon as the opportunity is presented. I have good things left to do and have no use for plans to expedite my death. How about ???? Thank you for joining the discussion.
gravenimage says
Good exchange, Flavius and Frank.
Frank Anderson says
As long as I have lived and at every opportunity I have been taught that courtesy and hospitality are vital to a good life. Thank you.
mortimer says
IT’S THE IDEOLOGY, STUPID. ISLAMIC JIHAD IDEOLOGY.
Follow the money. Stop the funding of jihad.
Deprogram jihadists right out of Islam to be safe. Only pious Muslims conduct jihad.
No Islamic belief = No jihad.
MFritz says
Indonesia is the next country to go fully “medieval”.
762x51FMJ says
Did you hear about the Muslim who stubbed his toe getting coffee ?
At Krakatoa East of Java ?
gravenimage says
I wish everything about Muslims was so amusing…
Flavius Claudius Iulianus says
And we all know how the Mohammadans admire Hitler:
https://www.rt.com/news/409488-indonesia-museum-auschwitz-wax-hitler/
Notice that one of the Indonesians posing with Hitler is wearing a kafeeya on his head.
gravenimage says
Indonesia: Islamic State raising money through WhatsApp, Twitter, Bitcoin and PayPal
…………………..
Yet many of these same groups are shutting down contributions to groups that oppose the Islamic State and other Jihadists. Insanity.