The Counter Extremism Project (CEP) is a

non-profit A nonprofit organization (NPO) or non-profit organisation, also known as a non-business entity, not-for-profit organization, or nonprofit institution, is a legal entity organized and operated for a collective, public or social benefit, in co ...

non-governmental organization A non-governmental organization (NGO) or non-governmental organisation (see American and British English spelling differences#-ise, -ize (-isation, -ization), spelling differences) is an organization that generally is formed independent from g ...

that combats extremist groups "by pressuring financial support networks, countering the narrative of extremists and their online recruitment, and advocating for strong laws, policies and regulations". CEP was formally launched on 22 September 2014, by former senior government officials, including former the Homeland Security adviser

Frances Townsend Frances M. "Fran" Fragos Townsend (born December 28, 1961) is an American lawyer and business executive who served as Homeland Security Advisor to United States President George W. Bush from 2004 to 2007, and was formerly the executive vice pr ...

, former Connecticut Senator Joseph Lieberman and

Mark Wallace Mark David Wallace (born December 31, 1967) is an American businessman, former diplomat and lawyer who has served in a variety of government, political and private sector posts. He served in several positions during the administration of Presi ...

, a former U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations. The mission of the organization is to fight global extremism, with an initial goal of disrupting the financing and online recruitment and propaganda of the

Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant An Islamic state is a state that has a form of government based on Islamic law (sharia). As a term, it has been used to describe various historical polities and theories of governance in the Islamic world. As a translation of the Arabic term ...

(ISIS). The group is modeled on

United Against Nuclear Iran United Against Nuclear Iran (UANI) is a bi-partisan, non-profit advocacy organization in the United States. Its stated objective is to "prevent Iran from fulfilling its ambition to become a regional super-power possessing nuclear weapons." Along wi ...

, an advocacy group led by Wallace which has had success increasing economic pressure on the

Islamic Republic of Iran Iran, officially the Islamic Republic of Iran, and also called Persia, is a country located in Western Asia. It is bordered by Iraq and Turkey to the west, by Azerbaijan and Armenia to the northwest, by the Caspian Sea and Turkmeni ...

. Other prominent board members include Gary Samore, August Hanning,

Dennis Ross Dennis B. Ross (born November 26, 1948) is an American diplomat and author. He has served as the Director of Policy Planning in the State Department under President George H. W. Bush, the special Middle East coordinator under President Bill Clin ...

and

Irwin Cotler Irwin Cotler, PC, OC, OQ (born May 8, 1940) is a retired Canadian politician who was Member of Parliament for Mount Royal from 1999 to 2015. He served as the Minister of Justice and Attorney General of Canada from 2003 until the Liberal gov ...

. CEP is a 501(c)(3) non-profit organization. It can accept tax-deductible contributions on a confidential basis. For security reasons, CEP generally declines to name its financial backers, except for

Thomas Kaplan Thomas Scott Kaplan (born September 14, 1962) is an American billionaire businessman, philanthropist and art collector. Kaplan is the world's largest private collector of Rembrandt's works. Kaplan is the chairman and chief investment officer of ...

, a billionaire investor who also supports United Against Nuclear Iran.

Digital Disruption Campaign

CEP launched its "Digital Disruption Campaign" to remove accounts associated with ISIS from social media networks in order to deny them popular platforms to incite violence, spread their ideas and recruit members. The campaign has particularly focused on ''

Twitter Twitter is an online social media and social networking service owned and operated by American company Twitter, Inc., on which users post and interact with 280-character-long messages known as "tweets". Registered users can post, like, and ...

'', calling on the company to adopt new policies to prevent extremists such as ISIS from misusing their platform, as well as identifying ISIS accounts and alerting ''Twitter'' to remove them. ISIS has made extensive use of social media, especially ''Twitter'', to recruit fighters and to distribute propaganda videos, including clips that show the decapitation of American journalists and a British foreign aid official. The campaign has led to death threats such as beheading against the CEP president Frances Townsend on ''Twitter'' from

jihadist Jihadism is a neologism which is used in reference to "militant Islamic movements that are perceived as existentially threatening to the West" and "rooted in political Islam."Compare: Appearing earlier in the Pakistani and Indian media, Wes ...

accounts. CEP started by collecting ISIS propaganda to learn how it tailors its messaging to various audiences. CEP had this material translated into English to make it easier for academics, reporters and other researchers to study ISIS and its methods. CEP then crafted a counter-narrative that brought attention to human rights abuses under ISIS, its use of extreme violence against women, children and non-combatants.

YouTube study

A study released by CEP in July 2018, determined that while ''YouTube'' had made a great deal of progress towards removing extremist content, terrorists still had a large audience on the site. CEP determined that between March and June 2018 ISIS members and supporters uploaded 1,348 videos to the site which received 163,391 views over the same period. 24% of those videos remained on ''YouTube'' for at least two hours. Many of these videos were shared on ''Facebook'', ''Twitter'' and other social media sites before ''YouTube'' could delete them. These videos were posted using 278 accounts. Roughly 60% of these accounts were allowed to remain active by ''YouTube'' despite having been used to upload extremist content that violated the site's terms of use. Hany Farid, a senior advisor to CEP, criticized ''YouTube''. He said, "We know these videos are being created for propaganda purposes to incite and encourage violence, and I find those videos dangerous in a very real way." CEP searched ''YouTube'' using 185 keywords commonly associated with ISIS. These included the Arabic terms for "crusader." "jihad". the names of ISIS-controlled geographic locations, media outlets and propagandists. CEP created a software system that searched ''YouTube'' every 20 minutes over the three-month life of the study. The system then used CEP's video identification tool, eGLYPH, to compare the results to 229 known terrorist video clips. eGLYPH generates a unique signature called a "hash" for each video or section of a video. This, in turn, allows known videos to be identified even if they have been edited, copied or otherwise altered.

Global Youth Summit Against Violent Extremism

On 28 September 2015, CEP co-hosted the first Global Youth Summit Against

Violent Extremism Violent extremism is a form of extremism that condones and enacts violence with ideological or deliberate intent, such as religious or political violence. Violent extremist views can manifest in connection with a range of issues, including politics ...

with the U.S. Department of State and

Search for Common Ground Searching or search may refer to: Computing technology * Search algorithm, including keyword search ** :Search algorithms * Search and optimization for problem solving in artificial intelligence * Search engine technology, software for findin ...

at The Roosevelt Hotel in New York City. The event "drew more than 80 youth leaders from 45 countries with the objective of developing outreach and social-media intervention initiatives that can be shared globally". Senior U.S. government officials who addressed the attendees included the U.S. Homeland Security Advisor

Lisa Monaco Lisa Oudens Monaco (born February 25, 1968) is an American attorney, former federal prosecutor and national security official who has served as the 39th deputy attorney general of the United States since April 2021. Monaco previously served as ...

, the

Under Secretary of State for Public Diplomacy and Public Affairs The Under Secretary for Public Diplomacy and Public Affairs is currently a top-10 ranking position in the U.S. Department of State that is intended to help ensure that public diplomacy is practiced in combination with public affairs and traditio ...

Richard Stengel Richard Allen Stengel (born May 2, 1955) is an American editor, author, and former government official. He was ''Time'' magazine's 16th managing editor from 2006 to 2013. He was also chief executive of the National Constitution Center from 2004 ...

, and the Under Secretary of State for Civilian Security, Democracy, and Human Rights Sarah Sewall. The summit also used presentations from ''

Facebook Facebook is an online social media and social networking service owned by American company Meta Platforms. Founded in 2004 by Mark Zuckerberg with fellow Harvard College students and roommates Eduardo Saverin, Andrew McCollum, Dustin Mosk ...

'' and

Microsoft Microsoft Corporation is an American multinational technology corporation producing computer software, consumer electronics, personal computers, and related services headquartered at the Microsoft Redmond campus located in Redmond, Washin ...

. A panel of judges at the summit awarded $100,000 to youth activist programs it believed would have the greatest impact.

NORex

In June 2016, CEP unveiled a software tool for use by Internet and social media companies to "quickly find and eliminate extremist content used to spread and incite violence and attacks". A CEP senior advisor. Hany Farid, a computer scientist who specializes in the forensic analysis of digital images, developed the software. It functions similarly to PhotoDNA, a system that uses robust hashing technology that Farid worked on developing with Microsoft, which is "now widely used by Internet companies to stop the spread of content showing sexual exploitation or pornography involving children". To operate this new technology to combat extremism, CEP proposed the creation of a National Office for Reporting Extremism (NORex), which would house a comprehensive database of extremist content and function similar to the

National Center for Missing & Exploited Children The National Center for Missing & Exploited Children (NCMEC) is a private, nonprofit organization established in 1984 by the United States Congress. In September 2013, the United States House of Representatives, United States Senate, and the Pres ...

. President Obama supported this initiative. Lisa Monaco, Obama's top counterterrorism adviser, said, "We welcome the launch of initiatives such as the Counter Extremism Project's National Office for Reporting Extremism that enables companies to address terrorist activity on their platforms and better respond to the threat posed by terrorists' activities online."
- Wallace stated that if this system were to be adopted by social media companies and the private sector, it "would go a long way to making sure that online extremism is no longer pervasive".

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