The research paper German Users Within the Terrorgram Network: A Dark Field Study on the Activity of German Users in Militant Accelerationism provides the first empirical results on the involvement of users with a local connection to Germany in the transnational right-wing terrorist Terrorgram network on the Telegram platform.
Militant accelerationism poses a serious threat to democratic society - an increase in the scene's activities has been observed since 2018 at the latest, including the right-wing terrorist attack in Halle in 2019 and other foiled attack plans. The analysis underlines the existing threat potential and shows that German users are actively involved in the right-wing terror network: 83 so-called heavy users with particularly high activity, who pose an increased threat potential, have been identified among German users to date. It is also clear that Telegram's reactions remain inadequate despite the ongoing danger: Information provided by the platform itself shows that less than five percent of the identified groups have been blocked so far. Platform blocks are an effective means of removing radicalized users from the network.
Based on a theoretical classification of the ideology of militant accelerationism, the research paper traces the activity of German users within the Terrorgram network. It also becomes clear that the scene is evolving. The results make it clear that authorities should develop an understanding of the ideology of militant accelerationism as a network, but also of its changeable connection strategies to other parts of the far-right scene and other misanthropic online communities. This understanding is the prerequisite for containing the potential threat.