Katherine Keneally, ISD Director of Threat Analysis & Prevention, recently spoke to Security Management about ISD’s work researching extremist movements and the value of open-source research.

Katherine described her role to the outlet, noting the wide-ranging aspect of her and her teams’ work.

“I lead a team of researchers looking into links between online threats and offline violence across the ideological spectrum,” Katherine said. “We look at the right, the left, Salafi jihadism, and a variety of single issues and conspiracy theories that don’t really fit into any box.” 

The outlet highlighted ISD’s ability to identify common themes and language across seemingly disconnected communities. On this topic, Katherine described ISD’s focus on youth-led, nihilistic violent extremism. 

“A lot of the work that my organization and my team are doing right now is related to the threat of school shootings and doing research and analysis to be able to do something about it. [Open-source research] has such a high potential to make an actual difference for our society.” 

The full article is available on Security Management.