Surfsafer: NACTA’s online portal for counter extremism launched
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ISLAMABAD - National Counter Terrorism Authority (NACTA) has developed an online reporting portal, aimed at countering online extremism, abuse of internet and social media.
“Surfsafer “is an online reporting portal for Pakistanis to report extremist online-content freely, securely
and anonymously as well. The other purpose of responsive web portal is to create eyes and ears in cyber-sphere to counter radical and extremism ideology in online realm.
The implementation status (NACTA Review – December 2017) of National Action Plan (NAP) on Tuesday revealed that the mission of surfsafer (link) is to counter online extremism, map and eliminate extremist content, help victims of extremism by regaining space for values of moderation, love and fraternity in cyber-sphere through community participation and ultimately make internet a safer place for everyone.
It said in order to filter social media sites and enable vigilance against cyber-crimes, `Prevention of Electronic Crime’ Act-2016 has already been passed by parliament and constant vigilance of internet traffic has resulted in blocking of 1447 URLs which hosted extremist content.
NACTA and Federal Investigation Agency (FIA) are continuously coordinating on this issue.
The Review further revealed that mobile applications are also being developed and in their final stages. These are scheduled to be launched on Google Play Store and Apple Store soon.
NACTA’s Android and iOS applications (Tat’heer apps) are mobile-based user-friendly systems which will enable a common citizen to report any incidence of hate speech or extremist content in form of video, audio, photo and URL/text visible to them on cyber-sphere.
Tat’heer (literal meaning “to sanitize”) is a multi-pronged Cyber Counter-Terrorism (Cyber CT) drive by NACTA which includes mapping of radical content available on internet/social media, and measures to counter such content and its spread and dissemination.
It is mentioned here that social media and the internet have a significant impact on way of life, enabling access to information and audio-visual media, among other resources, for everyone.
However, these modern tools are now used to promote, recruit and train militants besides funds collection and transfers. As such this sector has been given special emphasis in the NAP.