Use of new technologies for terror activities a challenge: India at UN meet

India on Saturday warned about the threat posed by the use of varied technologies for terrorist activities as they become "cheaper and more readily available". India's Permanent Representative to UN Ruchira Kamboj said the new and emerging technologies have helped fuel economic growth and offer the possibility to reduce existing inequalities, however, they have also thrown several challenges that demand our attention and urgent action.

"The use of new technology for terrorist purposes is increasing, diversifying and evolving as varied technologies become cheaper and more readily available," Kamboj said in her opening statement on Day 2 of the UN Security Council's Counter-Terrorism Committee meeting.

"Proliferation in online activities particularly during the pandemic has given terrorists the opportunity to spread their toxic narratives honing their propaganda, particularly targeting youth and children including through gaming platforms," she added.

India is hosting the two-day anti-terrorism meeting of the United Nations Security Council (UNSC). The ongoing meeting in Delhi is being held under India's chair of the Counter-Terrorism Committee.

Addressing the meeting, external affairs minister S Jaishankar underlined that the threat of terrorism is growing and expanding despite the UN Security Council's significant efforts in the last two decades to combat the menace. Jaishankar said that the technologies have also thrown up new challenges for governments and regulatory bodies given the "very nature of some of these technologies and the nascent regulatory environment."

"UN Security Council, in the past 2 decades, has evolved an important architecture built primarily around the Counter-Terrorism Sanctions Regime to combat this menace. This has been very effective in putting those countries on notice that had turned terrorism into a state-funded enterprise," the minister said.

"Despite this, the threat of terrorism is only growing and expanding, particularly in Asia and Africa, as successive reports of the 1267 Sanctions Committee monitoring reports have highlighted," he added.

Jaishankar further stated that the internet and social media platforms have turned into potent instruments in the toolkit of terrorists and militant groups for spreading propaganda, radicalisation and conspiracy theories aimed at destabilising societies.

"Another add-on to the existing worries for governments around the world is the use of unmanned aerial systems by terrorist groups and organised criminal networks," he added.