In Fifth Year, NCITE Adds Projects on Drones, AI, Intervention Programs, and More

OMAHA, Neb. — How might terrorists use drones? How might AI trick the humans operating America’s critical infrastructure? And how might local communities measure their levels of radicalization?

These are among the new research questions that experts at the National Counterterrorism Innovation Technology and Education Center (NCITE) are tackling in the center’s fifth research year. The University of Nebraska at Omaha-based NCITE once again received $4.6 million from the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) – an annual allocation on a 10-year grant that began in 2020 — to manage and conduct counterterrorism research. In total, and since 2020, NCITE has been awarded over $40 million in DHS grants and contracts.

The new research projects pull in 12 new academic partners, namely Boston Children’s Hospital-Harvard Medical School, Campbell Collaboration, the CNA Corp., Hampton University, Haskell Indian Nations University, Rice University, Towson University, University of Arkansas, University of Illinois Chicago, University of St. Andrews in Scotland, and the University of Texas–San Antonio. This brings to 38 the number of academic partners that NCITE has in an ever-growing consortium spanning the U.S. and Europe.

NCITE Director Gina Ligon, Ph.D., said the consortium expanded because top scholars around the globe applied to do groundbreaking work focused on keeping communities safe.

“From the professionalization of prevention practitioners to detection of drones over America’s farmland, the NCITE consortium is the government’s leading academic partner of counterterrorism scholarship in the U.S.,” she said.

In addition to the new work, NCITE is conducting over two dozen ongoing research efforts, which include topics of election security, threats to public officials, and domestic violent extremism. NCITE also has its lens on international threats that may become a problem for the U.S. homeland, and the Center is helping build an international research consortium, funding a website that identifies terrorist groups and their affiliations, and training local communities on how best to reintegrate foreign terrorist fighters.

The research NCITE conducts is crucial to the economic and national security of the United States, said DHS Chief Scientist Sam Howerton, Ph.D.

“Leveraging expertise from across the globe, the Center’s exploration of how terrorists might use advanced technology to promote harm allows the men and women of the department to better prepare for an increasingly complex world,” he said.

New Project Snapshots

Each NCITE research project aims to answer a vital question of national security.

How could terrorists use drones to cause harm? | University of Nebraska at Omaha, Towson University

• The problem: Commercially available, easy-to-get unmanned aerial systems (UAS) — commonly known as drones — allow violent extremists to conduct reconnaissance and surveillance, commit attacks, and coordinate criminal activity with greater flexibility. Today, the rapid increase in the availability and sophistication of UAS represents a significant challenge.
• The project: Applies an interdisciplinary lens (political science, criminology, cybersecurity, and information technology) to define the problem set related to terrorist drone attacks in the U.S. and advance the baseline understanding of this issue. Results will be shared in plain language rapid reviews, summary report of key findings, and at least one academic study for peer-reviewed publications as well as conference presentations and briefings to homeland security partners.

How could AI fool the humans responsible for critical infrastructure? | Penn State University

• The problem: Artificial intelligence (AI) is growing at alarming speeds, and its pace and widespread adoption has made it nearly impossible to develop necessary scientific understanding of how bad actors can leverage AI to infiltrate critical infrastructures – including water supply, agriculture, internet networks, and more. As AI technologies increasingly become a primary tool for humans working in critical infrastructure, researchers have raised concerns about human ability to detect hacked or compromised AI agents.
• The project: Aims to characterize the ways in which emerging technologies like VR and AI can be used to manipulate human operators within critical infrastructure applications.

How can communities measure their level of violent radicalization to evaluate prevention programs? | Boston Children’s Hospital/Harvard Medical School, University of Illinois Chicago

• The problem: There is a lack of reliable tools to effectively evaluate the impact of prevention programming. This undermines the ability of researchers and homeland security practitioners to assess whether terrorism and targeted violence prevention programs work as intended. One solution is to develop a way of measuring support for – and exposure to – violent radicalization at the community level.
• The project: Aims to create a survey instrument that measures support for, and exposure to, violent radicalization at the community level to improve measures of efficacy for terrorism and targeted violence primary prevention programs.

How can we evaluate terrorism and targeted violence intervention programs? | University of St. Andrews

• The problem: Many terrorism and targeted violence prevention programs use case management models to structure interventions working with at-risk or radicalized individuals. But studies show that efforts to determine what works in these interventions are often met with practical and ethical challenges that cannot be easily overcome using current methods.
• The project: The project will create a toolkit for assessing whether and how interventions work to produce positive outcomes. This toolkit will be designed to help stakeholders in the United States evaluate the implementation of case management interventions aimed at preventing terrorism and targeted violence.

How does suspicious activity reporting compare across multiple forms of targeted violence? | University of Nebraska at Omaha, University of Arkansas

• The problem: To date, there has been limited evaluation of the efficacy of the sixteen indicators of suspicious activities established by the Nationwide Suspicious Activity Reporting (SAR) Initiative (NSI). Typically focusing on acts of terrorism and mass shootings, prior studies have yet to fully examine the nature of SAR information for targeted violence more generally.
• The project: The project will collect and codify data associated with the NSI’s 16 SAR indicators, capitalizing on new access to information provided by multiple fusion centers – state-owned and operated centers that evaluate suspicious activity reports. Researchers will then conduct interviews with fusion center analysts and other representatives to identify and contextualize best practices and hindrances to the SAR process. Findings will inform the development of behavioral threat assessment frameworks.

What assessment tools can we use to evaluate terrorism and targeted violence prevention program outcomes? | University of Nebraska at Omaha

• The problem: Over the past 20 years, terrorism and targeted violence prevention (TVTP) has been a point of policy emphasis for governments around the world at federal, state, and local levels. However, measuring the effectiveness of TVTP programs continues to be a challenge.
• The project: Will develop and validate two instruments suitable for assessing TVTP program outcomes, specifically focusing on two areas of interest – tolerance of violence and identifying concerning behaviors. Developing these assessments will lead to a deeper understanding of TVTP programming outcomes and provide mechanisms for government and practitioners to evaluate TVTP programs.

How can we better understand the current threat landscape through interviews? | University of Arkansas

• The problem: A previous NCITE research project identified several limitations of existing datasets on domestic terrorism and other forms of targeted violence. Another project involved interviews with election workers who had been targeted by violence. Both projects seek to provide a greater understanding of the current threat environment in national security and electoral contexts.
• The project: NCITE researchers at the University of Arkansas will build on the work of the two previous NCITE projects. The team will interview academics who have created datasets related to terrorism and targeted violence as well as election officials who have been targeted with violence.