IS-Supporting Hacktivists in Southeast Asia
Key Findings
There is a growing trend of hacktivism activities in Southeast Asia, including Web site defacement, distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) attacks and information leaks. One group that operates using this strategy is the United Cyber Caliphate (UCC) collective, which operates with the support of the Islamic State (IS).
The increase in the Islamic State’s cyber activity in Southeast Asia is a result of its physical expansion into this region due to the loss of its core territory in Iraq and Syria. The region of Southeast Asia is characterized by poverty, unemployment and a Salafist
worldview, which are risk factors that expose the youth of the region to radicalization.
The cyber environment in Southeast Asia is characterized by rapid growth, poor information security and increasing levels of cyber-attacks. Combined with growing social dependence on connection technologies and the presence of a group of hacktivists, these elements will produce a real threat in the coming years.
This article is part of the RED-Alert project, funded by the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation Programme under grant agreement No 740688.
