Counteracting the Use of Gamification Technology for Terrorist and Extremist Purposes

Abstract

The development of information technologies, changes in the nature of work, transformation of public values lead to a spread of gamification technology and its wide use in the sphere of social management of public and business structures. The authors examine the historical aspect of the development of gamification technology and its practical application in different public sectors. Generalization of the existing data on the essence of gamification made it possible to work out its concept. The authors describe the mechanism of creating a game model and analyze approaches to its design. They are convinced that the advantages of gamification as a social technology are based on specific traits of human psychology and enable its use as a mechanism of covert manipulation. The paper presents examples of using gamification in business, state regulation, management of social processes. The research of the activities of transnational terrorist organizations became a basis for the conclusion that gamification technologies are actively used for terrorist and extremist purposes. The authors also analyze the threats of using gamification in terrorist activities, specifically, for increasing interest in such actions, recruiting new members of terrorist organizations, intensifying the activity of supporters, fundraising and committing terrorist acts. Specific attention is paid to threats of using the gamification technology on the territory of the Russian Federation. The counteraction to the use of gamification technology for terrorist and extremist goals becomes a context for analyzing the normative legal acts of the Russian Federation, including the Complex Plan of Counteracting the Ideology of Terrorism in the Russian Federation in 2019-2023. The authors present a complex of measures aimed at counteracting the use of gamification technology for terrorist and extremist purposes.