Bob Duval, Department of Political Science West Virginia University

1. News from Political Science:Group Violent Intent Signatures,International Interactions,& Associated ResearchDraft Presentation of ResearchWV EPSCoR RCG Grant Bob Duval, Department of Political Science West Virginia University Kyle Christensen, Department of Political Science West Virginia University

2. Outline of the Presentation • Description of web site collection task • Introduction to Signatures with examples. • Brief discussion of Social Network Methods and applications. • Discussion of Events Data Research • Overview of current and future research interests from the Political Science.

3. Web Site Archive • Currently we have three archives • A small (21 site) collection sampled every week since July 2007 • 1534+ files, 64M each week • A larger 51 group collection • 4.4Gigs with 81,000 files • An even larger 157 site collection • 6.2 Gigs in 179,000 files (all types) • With a Friend of a Friend collection • 12Gigs with 156,509 html files

4. Changes in web site • The small (21 site) data set lets us look at changes. • For example…

5. Signatures Defined • Signatures are statements made by groups or individuals that indicate a predisposition towards some form of action or thought. • The basis for studying text as an indicator of individual or group characteristics is rooted in the political psychology literature (Walker and Schaefer 2006)

6. Signatures Cont. • Our goal is to effectively monitor group intent over time using computational methods. The basis for the work is rooted in qualitative content analysis. • This requires baseline coding of sites, development of an archive, and integration of software tools. • Additionally, analysis of signatures in this manner bridges a substantial divide that exists between case based sociological and psychological literatures and existing formal and computational research.

7. Examples of Signatures • From the Army of God (Right Wing Anti-Abortion Religious Extremist Site –) • This site publishes Eric Robert Rudolph’s statements from prison • Examples: • Hebrews 12:4  Ye have not yet resisted unto blood, striving against sin. • Psalm 58:10The righteous shall rejoice when he seeth the vengeance:he shall wash his feet in the blood of the wicked. • Revelation 21:8But the fearful, and unbelieving, and the abominable,and murderers, and whoremongers, and sorcerers, andidolaters, and all liars, shall have their part in the lakewhich burneth with fire and brimstone: which is thesecond death.

8. More Examples • Some Commentary from the Aryan Nation (Right Wing Neo-Nazi Organization) • TERROR SHOULD BE MET WITH GREATER TERROR!   The Aryan Prophet, Adolf Hitler, 1943 • NEVER FORGET, "VIOLENCE SOLVES EVERYTHING!“Pastor Harold Ray Redfeairn  1952 – 2003 • 88! (conventional neo-Nazi code for “Heil Hitler!”) • Excerpts from Advice for Decentralized Activity or “Lone Wolves” • 1. ACT ALONE • 2.DO NOT ROB BANKS …. What you DO need is a job which is intermittent, seasonal, or which allows you to travel, which has flexible scheduling, etc. so you will have the TIME to engage in revolutionary acts. • 3. ACT SILENTLY. • 4. DO NOT DEFACE YOUR BODY WITH TATTOOS! • 5. UNDERSTAND THAT YOU ARE EXPENDABLE.

9. More examples • Examples from Yahweh ben Yahweh (An African American Religious Organization) • Project Megiddo has fired its linguistic guns at The Nation of Yahweh without cause or provocation. The war being waged against The Nation of Yahweh is designed to hide its sources' aversions for our belief system while casting aspersions against our founder and faith. Those sources and the FBI want to: make our founder and spiritual leader appear to be a terrorist; to make any one interested in learning more about The Nation of Yahweh hesitant about making an approach; and to make us victims of those who hate because of apparent or perceived differences in race, religion, or national origin. • We encourage you to examine the facts we have submitted in this article, and see for yourself that the vile warlike strategies employed against The Nation of Yahweh in Project Megiddo are unwarranted and unprecedented!

10. Existing SNA of Groups *N=56 with Isolates removed from the analysis

11. Content Analysis • Content Analysis provides us an excellent way to examine sites based an established coding scheme. • Existing work on the dark web has been focused on site sophistication and design or network structure. This provides an excellent opportunity to build a large N time series database that examines change in content over time. • Additionally, development of a human coding framework to code sites on a variety of key variables (i.e. trust in government, advocacy of violence) would make a sizable contribution to the existing literature. • Currently Political Science is using Yoshikoder and Profiler Plus. This allows us to examine the websites (Yoshikoder) and the writings of key individuals associated with the organizations (Profiler Plus)

12. An Example *Note This example used the Regressive Imagery Dictionary to Code Based on Primordial Vs. Conceptual Content.

13. How the Political Science component links to the broader conspiracy…. • Development of Qualitative Coding allows for further work on Graph Theoretic models. Additionally, use of MDS and other social network methods could produce several interesting papers. • Development of signature recognition tools based on coding to further development of software tools.

14. The Conspiracy Continues • Additional Group or sub-graph specific papers may be generated to increase presentation and publication prospects. • Work on Events Data structures leading regarding the Democratic Peace, • Network analysis of Polarity from 1948-1978 • Generate the network of foreign event-interactions across all nations – by year • Visualize the change in the network structure • Network analysis of two wars in Iraq • 1991 war highly cooperative • 2002-8 war highly divisive

15. And more • Examination of Islamic fundamentals group to look for clusters • Will have data set from Rachael Rudolph

19. YoshiKoder