
Primary research & datasets
ISD’s research is data-driven. The meticulous collection and analysis of primary data is vital to understanding the nature of the challenge that we face and thus plays a significant role in our overall research effort.
ISD is one of the world’s leading think tanks in the construction and analysis of primary datasets, including the largest database of social media profiles of women who have travelled from the West to support ISIS and their affiliates in Syria, Iraq and Libya, and the world’s largest database of those who travel to conflict zones to fight against ISIS.
ISD was also a lead partner in the construction of Professor Jytte Klausen’s Western Jihadism Project, and in partnership with RUSI, Chatham House and Leiden University, constructed a database that details all of the lone actor terrorist incidents that have taken place in Europe since 2000. This dataset contains over 70 variables, including biographic information, on a group of 120 perpetrators.
ISD Senior Research Fellow, Amarnath Amarasingam, has constructed the world’s largest collection of interviews with ISIS fighters who travelled to Syria and Iraq since the group’s inception, revealing the motivations of these individuals and the risks they pose if they return.
ISD is currently building databases of extreme far right influencers online, as well as amplifiers of state-supported disinformation and fake news.
Team

Amarnath Amarasingam
Senior Research Fellow


Chloe Colliver
Project Coordinator

Chloe Colliver
Project Coordinator

Jonathan Birdwell
Head of Policy & Research

Jonathan Birdwell
Head of Policy & Research