Discovery of improvised explosive device content in the Dark Web

Improvised explosive device related Web content offers a wealth of knowledge to members of the security and intelligence communities. However, acquiring the desired topical information remains a challenge for analysts due to issues including site identification, accessibility, and language. This paper presents a focused crawling approach for the discovery and collection of improvised explosive device content from the dark Web. Results and examples from an exploratory collection effort are described. Site map and link analyses were also performed, offering insight into the communication dynamics and publication of improvised explosive device Web content.