About the Book
Advances in digital technologies have provided ample positive impacts to modern society; however, in addition to such benefits, these innovations have inadvertently created a new venue for criminal activity to generate. Combating Violent Extremism and Radicalization in the Digital Era is an essential reference for the latest research on the utilization of online tools by terrorist organizations to communicate with and recruit potential extremists and examines effective countermeasures employed by law enforcement agencies to defend against such threats. Focusing on perspectives from the social and behavioral sciences, this book is a critical source for researchers, analysts, intelligence officers, and policy makers interested in preventive methods for online terrorist activities.
About the Author :
Majeed Khader is the Director of the Home Team Behavioural Sciences Centre under the Ministry of Home Affairs, and Deputy Director of the Police Psychological Services Division. Dr Majeed is also the Chief Psychologist of the Singapore Police Force. A trained hostage negotiator, his previous operational duties include being the ex-Deputy Commander of the Crisis Negotiation Unit and a trainer with the negotiation unit. He teaches criminal psychology part time as an Assistant Professor (Adjunct) at the School of Humanities and Social Sciences at Nanyang Technology University, Singapore. For the past 23 years, Dr Majeed has overseen the development of psychological services in the areas of stress, resilience, employee selection, deception psychology, leadership, crisis negotiations, crime profiling, and crisis psychology. For his work on the psychology of terrorism, he was awarded the National Day Public Administration Award (Bronze) in 2006 by the President of Singapore, and once again the Public Administration Award Silver in 2014. A forensic psychologist by training, Majeed holds a Masters degree (with Distinction) in Forensic Psychology from the University of Leicester (United Kingdom) and a PhD in Psychology (specialising in personality and crisis leadership) from the University of Aberdeen, Scotland. He also holds a degree in Economics and Sociology from the University of London. Dr Majeed has been invited as a speaker to organisations in Indonesia, Malaysia, Japan, Canada, Hong Kong and the United States to share on crime psychology, terrorism and leadership. He has also presented at the FBI, NCIS and the RCMP. He has been the Chairman of two major international conferences held in Singapore titled the ‘Asian Conference of Criminal and Operations Psychology’. He has been the Asian Director and sits on the board of the United States based Society of Police and Criminal Psychology. He is a Registered Psychologist with the Singapore Psychological Society, and a member of the British, and American psychological Societies. He has contributed several book chapters and published widely in peer-reviewed journal such as Journal of Research in Personality, Journal of Occupational Health Psychology, Psychology & Health, Cognition and Emotion, International Journal of Psychophysiology, Personality and Individual Differences, International Journal of Police Science & Management, Journal of Police and Criminal Psychology, Security Journal, etc. Neo Loo Seng is a Senior Behavioural Sciences Research Analyst with the Home Team Behavioural Sciences Centre at the Ministry of Home Affairs, Singapore. For the past nine years, Loo Seng has been specialising on the area of violent extremism, particularly in the areas of online radicalisation, online threat assessment, pre-attack warning signs, and the psychology of violent extremism. He has presented at many international conferences, trained law enforcement officers, and published many research reports and journals on the topic of violent extremism. He is a member of the Online Radicalisation Research Community of Practice (ORRCOP) that comprises Singaporean practitioners and subject matter experts involved in research related to online radicalisation. Academically, he teaches on the topic of psychology at a private university, and is currently pursuing his Master degree in psychology researching on the personality profiles of violent extremists at Nanyang Technology University. Gabriel Ong is Senior Assistant Director with the Psychological and Correctional Rehabilitation Division (PCRD) of the Singapore Prison Service (SPS). Concurrently, he is Assistant Director with the Resilience, Safety and Security Psychology Branch (RSSP) of the Home Team Behavioural Sciences Centre (HTBSC). Both PCRD and HTBSC are psychology units in the Ministry of Home Affairs, Singapore. His primary roles at SPS include overseeing the evaluation of rehabilitation programmes and regimes. Prior to this, he was involved in forensic risk assessment and offender rehabilitation, specifically in the area of sexual and violent offending. His primary roles at the HTBSC include overseeing research on issues such as violent extremism and resilience. He holds a Doctor of Psychology (Clinical) from the James Cook University (Singapore). He has been with the Ministry of Home Affairs since 2001. Eunice Tan is a Senior Psychologist and Assistant Director of the Operations and Leadership Psychology Branch, Home Team Behavioural Sciences Centre (HTBSC), Ministry of Home Affairs, Singapore. As a pioneering member of the centre, she played an integral role in the development and setup of this research and training centre, particularly in the area of leadership assessment, selection, development and training. Her early forays into behavioural sciences research at HTBSC involved understanding the radicalisation processes of terrorists. Her presentation and work on a radicalisation model of terrorists, based on the Singapore experience with terrorism in 2002, won the Chris Hatcher Award for Best Vision during the 34th Annual Conference of the Society for Police and Criminal Psychology (SPCP) in 2007. Eunice’s main research interests include understanding offending behaviour, radicalisation processes of extremists, the assessment and selection of high potentials, issues in critical incident command, crisis leadership, and command leadership in the public safety and security context. As part of her secondary duties, Eunice has been a team psychologist with the Crisis Negotiation Unit of the Singapore Police Force since 2007. In addition, she is also part of the Critical Incident Stress Intervention & Support team led by the Singapore Police Psychological Services Division. Eunice holds an MSc in Investigative and Forensic Psychology from the University of Liverpool (United Kingdom). She is also a member of the Society of Police and Criminal Psychology (SPCP), USA. Jeffery Chin is a Senior Psychologist at the Home Team Behavioural Sciences Centre. Key areas of his work at the centre include applied research in investigative interviewing, deception and leadership during critical incidents. As a concurrent appointment, Jeffery also supports the operations of the Crisis Negotiation Unit, Singapore Police Force as a psychologist. Jeffery holds a Master degree in Investigative and Forensic Psychology from the University of Liverpool (United Kingdom). His Master’s dissertation topic was on critical incident leadership.
