Europe flags online youth-driven violent extremism as new security threat

European authorities have warned that youth-driven online networks are fuelling violent attacks offline. The trend adds to the continuing jihadist threat and makes prevention harder in encrypted digital spaces.Image used for representational purposes onlyA quarter of a century after the Al-Qaeda attacks on the United States, jihadist groups still pose a major security threat in Europe, but authorities are now increasingly concerned about a newer danger driven largely by young people online. Investigators say this emerging trend, described as nihilistic violent extremism, is organised through online networks and is leading to attacks offline.European Union Counter-Terrorism Coordinator Bartjan Wegter said the threat is marked by a fixation on violence rather than ideology. "It's violence for the sake of violence," he told The Associated Press ahead of the 25th anniversary of the September 11 attacks on New York and Washington in 2001.Police investigators from nine European countries found about 4,340 URL addresses linked to "The COM", as the online community has come to be known, during a campaign to disrupt it in June and July. The exact size of the network remains unclear. Europol does not keep statistics on nihilistic violent extremism because definitions vary and some acts can be treated as ordinary criminality as well as terrorism.Overall, 45 terrorist attacks were reported last year across 10 of the EU's 27 countries, though none were major mass-casualty incidents. About half were foiled or failed, but six people were killed. Europol said 486 people suspected of terror links were arrested in 21 member countries. Jihadist groups, often guided or inspired by networks outside Europe, were behind 24 of the attacks and accounted for more than 70 per cent of the arrests. Around one third of those taken into custody were aged under 18, mostly boys. Authorities say the new threat has been growing over the past two to three years. In Finland in 2025, a 16-year-old boy stabbed three female student colleagues. He allegedly shared a "manifesto" in WhatsApp groups, recorded the attack on Snapchat and asked on social media for someone to save the video and give it to him after his release. In the "manifesto", he said he wanted to do something "significant" and "exciting". According to an EU document on the emerging threat, no political motive was given for the attack. In Italy last year, authorities said a 15-year-old boy planned a murder to gain notoriety online and had images and videos of assaults, murders, school shootings and child pornography on his smartphone.Wegter said these were not isolated cases but part of online networks that are "often driven by young people, for young people often involving young boys". He said they "lead to offline violence. We've seen stabbings, a young individual stabbing an elderly person for no reason whatsoever." He added: "It's very much a fascination with violence. It's violence as a means of asserting oneself, as a means of gaining status in those online communities. There's not a direct link with ideology." He also said such attacks are hard to prevent because they often involve "young individuals who will not have a criminal record, usually, who don't leave any footprints other than online perhaps, but then it's often behind encrypted walls and communities". Among the groups high on the authorities' radar is 764, founded by American high school dropout Bradley Cadenhead. He is serving an 80-year prison sentence for child pornography and sex offences, but the group is still active. In Germany last year, a 20-year-old man believed to be a leading 764 member faced 123 charges over acts of "an unimaginable level of brutality and inhumanity", including murder, rape and the sexual abuse of children, the EU document said.Wegter said that unlike 25 years ago, the terror threat facing Europe today is mostly organised online. "The online environment, for all the good things it brings, it is still too permissive," he said, describing it as "a petri dish for the connection between different threats". Privacy advocates argue that people have a fundamental right to communicate without unjustified intrusion and accuse authorities and some companies of weakening protections through spyware and other methods. But Wegter said, "Our law enforcement must be equipped with the instruments and tools to deal with the threat as it exists today." He noted that 85 per cent of investigations take place in the digital environment, adding, "It means that we have to adjust ourselves to that." He also said this required closer engagement with authorities and organisations in other countries, especially those used by such groups as a rear base: "Because what happens outside our borders impacts on our security," including what is amplified online.Europol said criminals are using images and audio to create and edit propaganda, including through deepfakes, memes and GIFs. AI-powered bots are also being used to boost recruitment and promote terrorist ideologies, while AI-driven apps are being used for research to prepare attacks. As Wegter put it, "The kind of violent content, violence inciting content, propaganda, manuals, tactics, everything that is available, is very much amplified by AI." Together, the figures and cases underline how Europe continues to face the threat from jihadist groups while also grappling with a fast-growing form of online-driven violent extremism.With PTI Inputs- EndsPublished By: India Today Web Desk Published On: Sep 8, 2026 11:06 IST