Youth as an Object of Online Extremist Propaganda: The Case of the IS

A youth audience is the most vulnerable part of society as an object of influence of radical ideas. The authors argue that the most efficient tool of involving young people of different origin and confessional affiliation into the extremist activity on the present stage is social networks. Despite the fact that the practice of using communication networks in the Internet space by terrorist organizations have existed before, it was the information policy of the ISIS (and later IS) that was characterized by the greatest effectiveness, due to the creation of an integrated media structure, which consisted of numerous foundations and agencies (“Al Furqan”, “Aynad”, “Itisaam”, “Al-Hayat”, etc.), allowing them to spread their extremist religious and ideological doctrine on a global scale. The use of the widest range of high-quality media products in Internet media and social networks has expanded the organization’s area of influence by attracting supporters not only from the Middle East region, but also from European countries and the Russian Federation. The case-study of the mechanisms for attracting European youth through social networks, such as Twitter, Facebook, etc., to extremist activities under the auspices of the IS is held. In conclusion, the prospects for the influence of IS propaganda in social networks after the defeat of a terrorist organization in 2018 are assessed. As a methodological basis of the research, aspect and activity approaches, as well as analytical, statistical methods and the method of content analysis are used.