Announcement: Terrorist Content Analytics Platform (TCAP) Phase 2

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Tech Against Terrorism is pleased to announce that the Government of Canada has awarded Tech Against Terrorism up to $1.9 million of funding over three years for Phase 2 of the TCAP.

At the Christchurch Call 2022 Leaders’ Summit on 20 September 2022, the Canadian Prime Minister, the Right Honourable Justin Trudeau, announced the funding for the TCAP. Following the event he tweeted:

Adam Hadley, Founder and Director of Tech Against Terrorism, said:

“We want to express our gratitude to the Government of Canada for their continued support for us in our work countering terrorist and violent extremist use of the internet whilst respecting human rights. With this additional support, we will be creating an archive capability allowing civil society to audit decisions made by the TCAP to ensure such automation is accountable and upholds the rule of law.”

The Honourable Marco E.L. Mendicino, Canada’s Minister of Public Safety, said:

“Terrorist and extremist views and content do not belong anywhere online where they can influence others and incite violence. The Government of Canada is investing in real tools that can make the Internet a safer place for Canada, Canadians and the world.”

Phase 2 of the TCAP:

The first year of the TCAP expansion will cover archiving and classifying terrorist content to provide academics with a centralised knowledge base to inform counter-terrorism research, as well as providing hashes for smaller tech platform to reference against. This workstream will begin with a consultation period with lawyers, academics, tech platforms, and civil society to ensure the archive is developed to effectively support both academics and tech platforms whilst respecting human rights and the rule of law.

As part of Phase 2, the TCAP will facilitate secure intelligence-sharing between expert researchers and academics. By providing a secure and ethical manner of sharing online terrorist content, the TCAP will ensure that academic institutions and expert researchers can contribute in a protected manner to an increased evidence-based understanding of terrorist use of the internet, which will drive actionable research recommendations going forward.

Additionally, the TCAP will facilitate affordable intelligence-sharing for smaller internet platforms and support smaller tech companies in detecting terrorist content on their platforms. The TCAP will facilitate rapid sharing of content and URLs to alert smaller platforms and will coordinate support measures to cover the entire tech ecosystem. The TCAP will be a “one-stop shop” for tech companies to log-in and confidentially assess cases of suspected public exploitation of their technologies.

You can find Public Safety Canada's press release below:

September 20, 2022 - New York City, USA

As our world becomes more and more connected through digital devices and expanding online networks, knowledge is continuously available at our fingertips. With information so easy to access, the Government of Canada is committed to ensuring that social media and other online platforms are not used as tools to incite, publish and promote terrorism, violence, and hatred.

Today, at the Christchurch Call 2022 Leaders' Summit, the Prime Minister, the Right Honourable Justin Trudeau, announced that Canada will commit up to $1.9 million in funding over three years to Tech Against Terrorism for Phase 2 of their Terrorist Content Analytics Platform (TCAP), a secure online tool that automates the detection, notification, and analysis of verified terrorist content.

This funding is made available through the Canada Centre for Community Engagement and Prevention of Violence’s Community Resilience Fund (CRF), which supports partnerships and innovation in countering radicalization to violence in Canada.

In June 2019, in support of the Christchurch Call to Eliminate Terrorist & Violent Extremist Content Online, the Government of Canada provided approximately $1 million in funding through the CRF for Tech Against Terrorism to create the TCAP.

Building on the TCAP’s successes, Phase 2 of the platform will expand its capabilities to identify and assess more types of content across a wider range of platforms, and help develop a content moderation tool to assist smaller tech companies in quickly removing this terrorist content.

Investing in tools such as the TCAP helps keep Canadians safe by finding innovative and effective ways to address harmful online content, and to work with our global partners to combat terrorist and extremist activities in a rapidly changing digital landscape.