Security services and governments around the world remain vigilant to the threat of lone-actor terrorists in our cities.
But when there’s often no indication of an explicit intention or ideology, questions about mental health and with groups like Islamic State willing to encourage and claim responsibility for almost any attack, how do we define lone-actor terrorism?
In this comic explainer, Raffaello Pantucci, Associate Fellow at the International Centre for the Study of Radicalisation and Director of International Security Studies at RUSI, explains the theory behind lone-actor terrorism and what we know about lone actors’ effectiveness, motives and behaviours that could help us to better understand and disrupt future attacks.
Rachid Kassim is quoted from an interview with Jihadology.
Junaid Hussain’s quote is from court documents.
The full Countering Lone-Actor Terrorism Series is available at the Royal United Services Institute’s website.
Illustrations by Wes Mountain for The Conversation.