UK counter-terrorism citizen e-learning: Importance and challenges of involving the public in the fight against terrorism

How to cite this journal: Author, Date of the post, WMO Conflict Insight, Title of the post, ISSN: 2628 6998, https://worldmediation.org/journal/

ABSTRACT *

This article examines a British initiative to involve citizens in counterterrorism through free online training. After outlining earlier public guidance on surviving an attack and administering first aid, the author describes the ACT Awareness eLearning programme launched by the National Police Chiefs’ Council, which seeks to enable citizens to recognise suspicious behaviour and respond appropriately. The author weighs the benefits, principally the restoration of a sense of agency to a public whose fear is the object of terrorism, against the risks, including overconfidence after a short course, the danger that prejudice will be mistaken for observation, and the possibility that attackers themselves study the material. The article concludes that the approach is sound in principle but requires measurement of both prevented attacks and false alarms before other states adopt it.

KEYWORDS *

Counterterrorism, United Kingdom, citizen participation, ACT Awareness eLearning, public security, prevention, prejudice, islamophobia, police and public cooperation, evaluation

INTRODUCTION

The UK is one of the European countries that have been affected by terrorism for decades. It is also one of the countries that have experienced jihadist operational methods, like suicide attacks and the modern trend of the simple- yet effective- terror methodologies of knife and vehicle attacks. Trying to address the phenomenon of terrorism effectively, the country has followed the strategy of involving also its citizens in the campaign against terror. First came the three words “slogan”: HIDE- TELL-RUN, a piece of advice by the UK police on how citizens can go through and survive a terror attack, mainly one carried out by firearms and/or weapons[1]. Also, the British Red Cross gave advice about how first aid should be administered in case of a terror attack[2]. In both cases, the approach was mainly that of dealing with the event and the aftermath, somewhat from the position of a victim. Recently though the National Police Chiefs Council launched a new program, one of online counter-terrorism training for its citizens[3].

MAIN CORPUS

The “Action Counter Awareness eLearning”[4] project aims to create “CT citizens”[5] able to spot, understand suspicious behavior and take the correct steps for protection until the authorities arrive and take charge. The training is given online and it is for free. It comprises seven modules and takes less than an hour to complete[6]. Basically, citizens get trained to be able to be part of the operational response to a possible terror attack and help with prevention.

There are obvious advantages to this training. First of all, citizens who are the target of terror attacks- especially of the indiscriminate type the Islamist terror network uses- regain power. Terrorism is a reign of fear, it makes the public feel vulnerable, defenseless and this is its main power and propaganda tool. Citizens that know how to contribute to their security immediately feel they are no “sitting ducks”, they have an amount of power over events. Basically, they can do something, instead of facing the paralyzing option of “I can’t do anything to protect against a terror attack”. In an era that terrorism has become part of our reality, it is important to be able to respond and contribute actively to the procedure that protects us. Furthermore, citizens come even closer to the police and learn to cooperate with them for the good of the public order.

Of course, such involvement of citizens in counter-terrorism poses also challenges that should be taken under consideration. The most important is that counter-terrorism is not a subject to be trained online for an hour and be so easily capable to help thwart effectively a terror attack. Moreover, when it can be often difficult even for authorities to put aside stereotyping and prejudice, one can imagine how the public can make wrong judgment calls considering suspicious people that just “look different”. Strange behavior may very well be a behavior some people don’t comprehend, they are not used to it or even do not like it. For certain people, a woman in a hijab, or a man with a zabiba (prayer bump) on his forehead may be a priori perceived as suspicious. Additionally, having the confidence of a “counter-terrorism expert” because of a less than an hour e-course can lead some people to think that they could detect the development of a terror incident when they actually can not. Where basic knowledge and prejudice (even more particularly islamophobia) may meet, the outcome could be far from the effective one expected. And of course “future bad guys” can also benefit from the e-learning program and plan operations more carefully, avoiding tell signs that can be detected according to it.

SUMMARY *

The author’s assessment is balanced rather than one sided. The programme is credited with addressing the psychological core of terrorism, since a population that knows it can act is less susceptible to the fear on which such attacks depend, and with strengthening cooperation between citizens and police in a domain where the authorities cannot be everywhere. Set against this are three risks the author identifies: the illusion of competence produced by a short course, the likelihood that unfamiliarity will be read as suspicion where prejudice is already present, and the availability of the same material to those planning attacks.

CONCLUSION

As terrorism targets democracy, a way of protecting it is indeed to give power to citizens. The UK approach is moving in the right direction engaging the public to take part in a process that regards its protection. Security cannot be solely left in the hands of the police, as even for practical reasons- police officers and counter-terrorism units cannot be present everywhere. The collaboration of all stakeholders in society and using internet technology are vital steps in the fight against terrorism. The example of the UK seems to build a model other countries should follow. However, it is essential to be able to assess the success of such e-learning programs. It remains to be seen how many terror attacks will be thwarted by the effective involvement of “CT Citizens”, but also how many “false alarm” cases have occurred. In this way, we can measure the outcome of such learning programs in an objective manner, and then authorities in other countries can adopt them too as part of their counter-terrorism strategy.

POTENTIAL SOLUTION *

The tension the author identifies has a practical resolution, and it lies in what such training teaches people to look for. Programmes that direct attention toward behaviour, someone testing security arrangements, filming access points, abandoning a package, acting in ways that make no sense in that particular setting, produce reports that can be assessed. Programmes that leave the definition of suspicious to the observer produce reports about appearance, dress and language, which waste police time and fall on the same communities repeatedly. The difference is entirely a matter of curriculum design, and it should be tested openly: material of this kind can be reviewed in advance with the communities most likely to be affected by it, which improves the content and, equally important, signals that they are addressed as participants rather than as the subject matter.

Two further safeguards belong in any such scheme. The first is honest calibration of what an hour can achieve. Training that says plainly what citizens are not equipped to do, and directs them to report rather than to intervene, investigate or approach, prevents the overconfidence the author rightly fears and protects the public from placing itself in danger. The second is accountability for outcomes. Reports made in good faith that prove unfounded should carry no consequence for the person reported, which means recording practices that do not leave a permanent trace on someone cleared of any concern. Without that, a scheme intended to strengthen public confidence produces a population of people who have been marked by a neighbour’s misreading.

The evaluation the author calls for deserves to be more than a count of attacks prevented. Because prevented attacks are rarely attributable to a single cause and cannot be publicly detailed, that measure alone will never demonstrate much. What can be measured is the ratio of actionable to unfounded reports, the demographic pattern of who is reported and by whom, and, through community surveys, whether the programme increased or diminished trust between the police and the communities most affected. That last measure matters most, because counterterrorism depends on information reaching authorities from precisely those communities, and a scheme that raises suspicion of them reduces the flow of the intelligence it was meant to generate.

Finally, the objection about attackers studying the material deserves less weight than it first appears. Publicly available guidance is by design generic, describing what any observant person might notice rather than the operational detail on which detection actually depends, and the security benefit of a population that is alert generally exceeds the marginal advantage gained by an attacker who reads it. That calculation holds only, however, if the training genuinely teaches observation rather than suspicion. Which returns to the same point: the value of arming citizens with awareness depends entirely on what they are taught to see.

* Added by the WMO Editorial Team

REFERENCES

References:

[1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QUCW_mk35Xc&feature=youtu.be

[2] https://www.redcross.org.uk/get-help/prepare-for-emergencies/how-to-prepare-in-case-of-a-terrorist-attack

[3] https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2019/12/08/free-counter-terrorism-training-offered-online-police-britons

[4] https://www.gov.uk/government/news/act-awareness-elearning

[5] https://www.hstoday.us/subject-matter-areas/transportation/u-k-seeks-ct-citizens-as-counter-terrorism-training-is-made-publicly-available

[6] https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-50708637

Supplementary references added by the WMO Editorial Team

National Police Chiefs’ Council and Counter Terrorism Policing, ACT Awareness eLearning, programme documentation, United Kingdom.

HM Government, CONTEST: The United Kingdom’s Strategy for Countering Terrorism, London, 2018.

Independent Reviewer of Terrorism Legislation, annual reports on the operation of the Terrorism Acts, London.

Innes, M., Roberts, C., & Lowe, T. (2017). A Disruptive Influence? Prevent ing Problems and Countering Violent Extremism Policy in Practice. Law and Society Review, 51(2), 252 to 281.

Open Society Justice Initiative (2016). Eroding Trust: The UK’s Prevent Counter Extremism Strategy in Health and Education, New York and London.