Video: Caught In The Web: The Lure Of ISIS

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Starkville, Miss. (WCBI) — Many questions still remain after two young people were arrested at Golden Triangle Regional Airport in an attempt to join ISIS.

It is know the group uses social media to lure in young people who are interested in joining their radical Islamic cause.

Director of the Distributed Analytics and Security Institute at Mississippi State University Dr. David Dampier has studied and taught cyber security for 15 plus years.

He believes social media, especially Twitter, is the main source of how the F.B.I. is able to track down those looking to go to Syria and Iraq to ISIS.

“If somebody were to tweet out Love ISIS, then anybody who is looking for that kind of hashtag would find and know who tweeted it…”, says Dampier.

Investigators believe the young girl who was arrested, Jaelyn Young, used the social media site to find out more about the radical group.

“All the things that are tweeted on Twitter across the world, you can gain access to with a subscription that you pay for…”, said Dampier, “…my best educated guess is the F.B.I uses this Twitter feed and mines it for the kinds of thing they’re looking for.”

Dampier also mentioned the fact that this Twitter server, which is very expensive to purchase, can track the time and geographic location of where the tweet was posted from anywhere in the world.

While investigators may have found a way to catch those trying to join ISIS, the question still remains…what makes someone want to join?

Dr. Brian Anderson, Dean of the College of Arts and Sciences at Mississippi University for Women, says it may have to do with finding a self-identity.

“We are seeing a generation of people who are feeling detached and alienated from the ways of the West…”, says Anderson, “…and they are curious about defining themselves with some sort of struggle, through some sort of struggle that may give them meaning spiritually as well as politically.”

Investigators also say Young recently converted to Islam.

Anderson said ISIS will likely target someone like that or someone who has kept their faith a secret.

“I think ISIS wants to play on that, wants to say deep inside you know that you’re identity can only be realized, can only be understood as being vibrant and true if you answer the call.

Anderson also told WCBI he believes a majority of those who leave for ISIS think the depiction of the group on television and other news sites is a false impression of what life is really like in that area of the world.