Are you interested in the intersection of counterterrorism and disruptive technologies? Do you want to help find ways to fight terrorism on online platforms while respecting human rights? Are you a tech professional with know-how of how machine-learning and data analytics can help prevent terrorist exploitation of technology?

Tech Against Terrorism and the Montreal Institute for Genocide and Human Rights Studies (MIGS) would like to invite you to a workshop on using AI to counter terrorism and the launch of the Data Science Network at Montreal’s Concordia University on 14 March.

The Data Science Network will harness the expertise of the tech community to develop, re-domain and help implement technological solutions to combat terrorist exploitation of tech. The network will galvanise developers, academics and experts through applying data analytics and machine-learning to create tools to prevent terrorist abuse of tech. Potential use cases would involve:

• Content classification algorithms based on Community Guidelines violations

• Translation/image translation, audio/image recognition and NLP/string matching including implementation of image-hashing technology to detect images/videos

• Application of neutral networks to content moderation and predictive modelling

• Link analysis and clustering of vulnerable accounts and content posts

• Payment typology analysis and classification of Suspicious Activity

• Evaluation of counter-narrative ROI and success metrics

The focus will be on convening an expert group to take on the terrorist threat and build easily deployable tools, or make existing tools readily usable, that can protect small tech companies and micro-platforms. At the end of the event, we will establish working groups on key areas, which may entail re-domaining expertise from specific fields in machine-learning and deploying it in a counterterrorism setting.

Tech Against Terrorism is a UN-mandated social impact startup helping small companies and micro-platforms confront terrorist exploitation of their services. Since 2017, we have engaged with over 150 global companies, and work with Facebook, Google, Twitter and Microsoft in the Global Internet Forum to Counter Terrorism (GIFCT). In 2017, Tech Against Terrorism launched the Knowledge Sharing Platform, a database that supports companies in developing Terms of Service, moderation procedures, and transparency reports.

Montreal Institute for Genocide and Human Rights Studies (MIGS) is based at Concordia University, and is Canada’s leading research and advocacy institute for the prevention of genocide, mass atrocities and violent extremism. Founded in 1986, MIGS serves as a watchdog for genocide risk around the world and educates both students and leaders in mass atrocity prevention.

*Registration does not guarantee attendance*