Some people enjoy getting pumped up to music before an event, whether it be a sales pitch to a big customer, a public speaking event, a date, a run, or a session with the weights at the gym. Basically a lot of people have a song that they turn to when they want to feel motivated, and unsurprisingly so do terrorists.According to a report from Defense One, it seems that it has been noticed that there might be some correlation between a particular video on YouTube seeing traffic spikes several days ahead of a terrorist attack. The video in question is called “Black Flags of Islam and Imam Mahdi” and back in December 18 2015, the video received a huge traffic spike and 8 days later, an ISIS-affiliated suicide bomber detonated his explosive vest at a mosque in Bagmara, Bangladesh.
This was repeated several times later ahead of other attacks earlier this year. This correlation was discovered by a predictive analytics company called Predata. According to one of the company’s executives Scott T. Crino, he likened the video to how weight-lifters might listen to AC/DC before lifting. He adds, “It gets them psyched up. So, often there’s a big spike in that particular [YouTube video], prior to an event occurring.”
That being said, even if the correlation were accurate, the question is what can one do with the information? After all knowing that something will happen is one thing, but where will it be happening, and when will it be happening are other questions that also need to be answered. In the meantime it looks like the terrorists will need to get the video from somewhere else as the video in question has since been removed from YouTube.
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