Internet giants who aid the enemy within

IN a chilling intervention, the head of MI5 warns Britain is facing the greatest terrorist threat in its history – with homegrown fanatics ‘being radicalised to the point of violence within weeks’.

Andrew Parker does not disguise his grave disquiet that young men who have been born and educated here should now view this country as an ‘enemy’ which they wish to destroy.

Nor does he pull his punches over who is helping to disseminate the poison that warps their minds: social media companies whose encrypted apps and chat rooms are used by Islamic State to ‘broadcast their message and incite and direct terrorism’ in the UK. So what must be done to confront a challenge which grows by the day?

As the Mail has repeatedly argued, the likes of Facebook and Twitter must do much more to help identify the fanatics and fulfil what Mr Parker calls their ‘ethical responsibility’ to keep us safe.

Muslim communities and universities – which the Prime Minister yesterday revealed had hosted no fewer than 70 hate preachers in the past year – must also take far greater steps to root out extremists.

Most controversially, security officials insist that, if terrorists are not to vanish off their radar altogether, further powers are needed to monitor internet and mobile phone use.

Already, there are howls of protest from the liberal Left, which proclaimed Edward Snowden a hero for revealing the West’s most sensitive intelligence gathering techniques.

Yet the bitter irony is that one of the main reasons why the new law is needed is to repair the damage that the US traitor and his cheerleaders so egregiously caused by showing our enemies where to hide on the web. The Mail has a proud history of defending individual freedoms from an overbearing State. But – unlike Snowden and his bien pensant friends – we also recognise the first duty of Government is to protect its citizens from being bombed and murdered in their streets.