Lawfare Daily: “I’m angry that I exist”: Nihilistic Violent Extremism with Seamus Hughes and Jacob Ware

Summary

Podcast Summary: The Lawfare Podcast Episode: “I’m angry that I exist”: Nihilistic Violent Extremism with Seamus Hughes and Jacob Ware
Date: March 10, 2026
Host: Peter Beck (Lawfare Institute)
Guests: Seamus Hughes (National Counterterrorism Innovation, Technology, and Education Center) & Jacob Ware (Lawfare Contributing Editor, extremism researcher, co-author of “God, Guns, and Sedition”)

---

Overview

This episode explores the rise of "nihilistic violent extremism" (NVE), a developing threat classed by the FBI, with particular attention to the online group 764 and the broader societal, ideological, and legal dilemmas this phenomenon presents. Seamus Hughes and Jacob Ware dig into the origins, patterns, and implications of NVEs, and discuss law enforcement responses, prevention difficulties, and what sets this form of violence apart from previous generations of domestic extremism.

---

Key Discussion Points & Insights

What is “Nihilistic Violent Extremism”? [02:23–05:16]

• Definition:
  • NVE is described as violence motivated not by a coherent ideology but by a hatred of society and a desire for chaos.
    • "The ideology is almost a simple one, which is nothing matters...we can do whatever we want because it doesn’t matter anymore." — Seamus Hughes [02:06]
  • First appeared in FBI court documents in March 2025 in relation to the Nikita Kassup case.
• Law Enforcement Challenge:
  • Use of the term is rising; cases classified as NVE are increasing, both in number and severity.
  • Law enforcement is struggling to categorize and respond, especially since perpetrators are often minors acting without a traditionally understood "cause."
    • "It's confusing...to look at a case of a 15-year-old kid...doing horrible things...in the name of nothingness." — Seamus Hughes [04:55]

---

The Evolution of Terrorism Classifications [05:16–07:20]

• Traditional Classifications:
  • “Domestic terrorism” historically covered a wide array of ideologies (left, right, single-issue, etc.).
  • “International terrorism” handled other cases like ISIS, Al Qaeda, etc.
• NVE’s Place:
  • NVEs, particularly groups like 764, often don’t fit into these classic buckets; the term is becoming a placeholder for new, online-driven violence communities that are neither clearly ideological nor foreign-influenced.

---

Types of Nihilistic Violent Extremist Groups [07:01–11:30]

• Two Main Categories (per Jacob Ware):
  • 764:
    • Online group merging white supremacy, Satanism, and nihilism with organized child sexual exploitation.
    • Tactics include ritualized humiliation or harm, often with a ranking-based structure for participants.
    • "The point is...to identify vulnerable individuals, usually young people...try to coerce them into acts of sexually explicit self-harm, up to and including suicide..." — Jacob Ware [07:20]
  • True Crime Community:
    • Online subculture venerating mass shooters and violent criminals, meticulously studying and sometimes seeking to "outdo" their acts.
    • "They'll meticulously study their tactics, targeting, their acts of violence...and then seek to copy them or...beat their high score." — Jacob Ware [01:45/10:07]
• Impact:
  • School shootings are particularly celebrated within these subcultures, and increasingly serve as models for future attacks.
  • "The violence...the violent tip of the spear of the nihilistic, violent extremist movement, has largely targeted schools." — Jacob Ware [11:15]

---

Motivations and Psychology of NVEs [11:30–15:45]

• Motivations:
  • Violence itself often becomes the ideology; some perpetrators may adopt ideological trappings post-facto.
    • "They may start with no ideology...but as they get farther...they come across...propaganda...they glom onto it at the end." — Seamus Hughes [13:08]
  • Radicalization is opportunistic and chaotic; manifestos are often contradictory or designed to troll.
  • Youth, isolation, online radicalization, and mental illness (especially suicidality) are predominant factors.
    • "Violence is the ideology, right? Or this idea of accelerationism to the point of ruining society." — Seamus Hughes [13:08]
    • "Most...violent cases...ended in suicide. That is a major factor." — Jacob Ware [15:45]

---

The Question of Terrorism Designation [20:12–24:41]

• Why terrorism?
  • There’s structure, hierarchy, and international presence (particularly in 764), making it more than a collection of one-offs.
    • "There's a level of pattern and structure...Take a group like 764...there's a command structure in this." — Seamus Hughes [20:12]
  • Labeling is useful for law enforcement mobilization and international collaboration, even if the ideology is absent.
    • "I would argue, this is almost like an ISIS...without the political dynamics...overthrowing society in general is a political means." — Seamus Hughes [20:38]
  • Other governments (Canada, New Zealand) have designated 764 as a terrorist organization.
• Difficulties:
  • No federal "domestic terrorism" charge in the US—NVE is more of an investigative concept than a legal one.
    • "There is no federal domestic terrorism charge...NVE is more of an investigative tool." — Jacob Ware [29:19]

---

Law Enforcement Tools and Prosecution [34:22–37:37]

• Federal Prosecutions:
  • 35 federal arrests related to 764, with about 160 charges—most are related to child exploitation, rarely terrorism as such.
    • "The vast majority of them are...child exploitation...And then the occasional cyber stalking." — Seamus Hughes [34:32]
• Victims-to-Perpetrators Cycle:
  • Many perpetrators started as victims; this complicates justice and prevention.
    • "Some...who have done these things, they were victims...three or four years prior...it does make it difficult to decide if you want to prosecute..." — Seamus Hughes [36:50]

---

Prevention & Challenges [37:47–42:01]

• Prevention is Key:
  • Emphasis on early intervention, education, and detection—yet current systems are failing.
    • "The solution here is going to be more on the prevention side...we’ve failed to build the infrastructure..." — Jacob Ware [37:47]
• Platforms & Entry Points:
  • Recruitment and grooming often start on mainstream platforms—Telegram, Discord, Roblox—preying on young users expressing vulnerability.
• Scope of Problem:
  • In the last year, 2,000 reports involving 764 to the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children; about half were initiated by victims themselves.
    • "Half of those reports came from victims...proactively reaching out...saying, like, listen, I don't know what I'm doing." — Seamus Hughes [41:16]

---

Does Leadership Targeting Diminish the Threat? [42:01–44:37]

• Effectiveness of Arrests:
  • Leadership (often teens themselves) arrests sometimes disrupt 764 activity but do not eliminate the threat; the phenomenon is cultural and networked.
    • "It's an online group that is kind of decentralized...but there is a central hierarchy system..." — Seamus Hughes [42:24]
  • Violence is mostly carried out by lone actors (like in other extremist movements), making disruption via leadership targeting limited in effect.
    • "You can go after leaders all you want, but...until you can confidently break the pathway...you're not going to be any closer..." — Jacob Ware [43:08]

---

Memorable Quotes

• On the ideology of NVE:
  • "Nothing matters...the world is absolutely jacked up and we can do whatever we want because it doesn't matter anymore." — Seamus Hughes [02:06]
• On radicalization narratives:
  • "Within the individual stories, you often see tales of isolation, loneliness, bullying, romantic frustration, violence in the home...these individuals are talking about revenge against society, against those who wronged them." — Jacob Ware [15:45]
• On law enforcement categorization:
  • "Nihilistic violent extremism...is largely now a placeholder for this idea of a 764 or true crime community type of network." — Seamus Hughes [06:20]
• On prevention and systemic failure:
  • "We failed to build the infrastructure...that can protect our young people. And this is just another case where they are being victimized and suffering for that." — Jacob Ware [41:16]
• On hope for cross-partisan action:
  • "A group like 764...can actually bring together all different sides because it's protecting children...we can kind of rally together as a country and say enough is enough." — Seamus Hughes [47:27]

---

Notable Timestamps

• [02:06] — Seamus Hughes on the core “nothing matters” NVE worldview
• [07:20–11:30] — Jacob Ware on types of NVEs, 764, and the true crime community
• [15:45] — Jacob Ware breaks down the mental health and suicidality component
• [20:12–24:41] — Debate: Why label these groups terrorism?
• [34:32] — Seamus Hughes gives numbers on prosecutions and charges
• [37:47] — Prevention and ethical dilemmas around victim-perpetrators
• [42:01] — Data on 764 reports to the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children
• [44:54] — Hopeful notes: foreign regulatory efforts and a rare bipartisan rallying point

---

Conclusion: The “Darkest” Current Threat & Glimmers of Hope

The episode’s tone is sobering, with both guests emphasizing the deep harm, complexity, and intractability of NVE as a threat. The violence is senseless, often targeting children and perpetuating cycles of harm. Yet, there is a call to prioritize prevention, cross-partisan cooperation, and possibly to innovate on platform moderation and youth protections—now being tested by allied countries. The emergence of NVE may finally prompt the legal and policy communities to think flexibly, not just in prosecution but in social and technological systemic reform.

---

Key Takeaway:
Nihilistic violent extremism, embodied by groups like 764 and amplified by online culture, represents a qualitatively new—if deeply familiar—form of threat. It challenges law enforcement, educators, and society to confront violence divorced from ideology, built on cycles of exploitation, and ever-evolving in the digital world. The urgency for flexible responses and prevention has never been greater.

Transcript

[Seamus Hughes]

The Electronic Communications Privacy act turns 40 this year and it's showing its age. On Friday, March 6, Lawfare and Georgetown Law are bringing together leading scholars, practitioners and former government officials for installing updates to ecpa, a half day event on what's broken with the statute and how to fix it. The event is free and open to the public in person and online. Visit lawfaremedia.org ecpaevent that's lawfairmedia.org ecpaevent for details and to register.

[Jacob Ware]

Want to turn challenges into chances? Go digital enterprise and adapt to every change by combining the real and digital worlds. Transform the everyday With Siemens, there's one place for the newest drops in wellness and performance and the biggest sale of the year. It's the drop by gnc, curating the best of what's new, handpicked by the pros who know what works. And right now, get it all. Buy one, get one 50% off during the semi annual LiveWell sale. From crushing workouts to leveling up your nutrition and everything in between, get the best deals on the latest innovations. All the newness is all on sale right now during the LiveWell sale on the drop by GNC. So they will trace the kind of ideological or radicalization pathway to an individual. They'll meticulously study their tactics targeting their acts of violence, and then they'll seek to copy them or, you know, in the kind of crude online pilots, they'll seek to beat their high score or beat their kill count.

[Peter Beck]

It's the lawfare podcast. I'm Peter Beck, associate editor at lawfair, with lawfare contributing editor and senior research faculty member at the University of Nebraska at Omaha's National Counterterrorism Innovation, Technology and Education Center. Seamus Hughes and Jacob Ware, the co author of God, Guns and Sedition.

[Seamus Hughes]

The ideology is almost a simple one, which is nothing matters on this because the world is absolutely jacked up and we can do whatever we want because it doesn't matter anymore. Nothing's going to change unless we do something. And if we do something, if it changes, all the better. But if it doesn't, who cares?

[Peter Beck]

Today we're talking about the rise of cases classified by the FBI as nihilistic violent extremism, or NBE, in the online terror group 764. So, Jacob, why don't we start with you? Could you tell us a little bit about where this term nihilistic violent extremism is coming from and how the FBI came up with it?

[Jacob Ware]

The term nihilistic violent extremism first appeared in court documents About A year ago, March 2025, with regards to a case involving an individual by the name of Nikita Kassup who had murdered his parents and kind of embarked on a, on a spree with the end goal of killing President Trump to start a race war. The language that the FBI uses, the definition they've used, is that MVE's are individuals who engage in criminal conduct within the United States and abroad in furtherance of political or religious goals that derive primarily from a hatred of society at large and a desire to bring about its collapse by sowing indiscriminate chaos, destruction and social instability. Every time, it seems to me and Seamus can weigh in on this, it seems every time that an official at the FBI speaks publicly about this movement and about the cases they've got, the number seems to rise. So it's pretty, it's pretty clear that this is emerging as a major priority for them now. I think we see that in our cases as well on the non government side.

[Seamus Hughes]

Yeah, Jacob's absolutely right. So I mean, listen, you look at this like evolution of the term. I would think of it like, you know, the FBI director, Cash Patel talked about some hundred active investigations like a few a year ago. I think they're at 425 as of last week, and I think next week it'll be 550. Right. There's a twofold thing happening at the same time. Right. One is a increase or a rise of kind of largely online groups that are nihilistic in nature in terms of just want to watch the world burn and cause as much chaos as humanly possible. And also a hesitation of still using the term domestic terrorism in this new administration. And so you kind of mix those all together and you see kind of a rise in cases. So this is not to say the numbers are clearly going up and there's cases going up and they're heinous cases of it. But it's also just somewhat a reflection of a new administration kind of working their way through new terminology and things like that. And also a bureau that's just trying to understand how to wrap their head around what the hell's going on on this.

[Peter Beck]

Right.

[Seamus Hughes]

It is confusing, understandably. So to look at a case of a 15 year old kid who's doing horrible things to another 15 year old kid in the name of nothingness, the name doing it just to do it. And so law enforcement is really grappling with one, like how do we quantify this? And two, is this kind of new and emerging or something different?

[Peter Beck]

Yeah, Seamus, could you elaborate on that a little bit and talk about the kind of past domestic terrorism classifications and how the bureau uses them?

[Seamus Hughes]

Yeah, I mean, so the, in the past, you know, domestic terrorism has. Domestic terrorism and nihilistic violent extremism kind of share the same bedfellows because it's always a catch all phrase, meaning that domestic terrorism in the Biden administration or even the previous Trump administration would encompass far left extremism, far right extremism, neo Nazism, anti abortion, pro abortion, environmental rights, you name it. That would kind of all catch in the catch all phrase of domestic terrorism. And then you had the other phrase of international terrorism or foreign terrorism or homegrown violent extremism, which would be kind of the traditional isis, Al Qaeda, Al Shabaab type of world of it we have seen. And Jacob's absolutely right. So this kind of first instance of showing up in legal documents was in, in March of last year. And what we find now is you'll kind of trace the, the evolution of the, the, the uses of in legal terms. It actually is a very good way to understand the usage within the bureau is it sometimes means they're looking, when they talk about nihilistic violent extremism, they might be me talking about someone who's trying to set a Tesla dealership on fire because they were upset about Elon Musk and Doge. And then sometimes it may mean a member who's part of 764 or an online exploitation group. What I think it's fair to say is you look at the kind of ebb and flow of it. Nihilistic violent extremism, I think is largely now a placeholder for this idea of a 764 or calm or true crime community type of network. And then those other groups, whether it be far right, far left, would be into a different category now.

[Peter Beck]

Yeah. Jacob, in a recent piece for Lawfare, you Talked about these two different groups of NVs, nihilistic violent extremists, and they fall into the true crime community and then more of the 764s. Could you talk about what those groups are, what the individuals are involved and that sort of thing?

[Jacob Ware]

Sure. Well, first I would just echo what Seamus pointed out, which is, I think the danger and opportunity with a term like NVE is it is going to become a capsule. It is already becoming that way. So part of what I was trying to, to get at in that Lawfare piece that came out, I think in December was, was trying to assess how this term might actually address trends or themes or topics or groups, actors that have been around since long before March 2025 incels, school shooters, for example, I think those actually have a place in this space. I wrote there that there are two big categories of MVES. One is the 764, and I think that is the kind of category that's gotten more attention. This is a very strange, very chaotic, very cruel online network that combines kind of elements of white supremacy, Satanism and true nihilism with basically ritualized child sexual exploitation. And so the point is, as far as I can tell, is to identify vulnerable individuals, usually young people, often young girls, and try to coerce them into acts of sexually explicit self harm, up to and including suicide, for the celebration and the enjoyment of members of the group. And so it's a really interesting kind of movement or issue, in part because, you know, Seamus and I, we both come from the counterterrorism world. And so this is quite upsetting, both personally, you know, emotionally, but also just kind of in terms of our categories, in terms of our bureaucracies, because this is also a child sexual abuse material issue. In fact, it might even primarily be a child sexual abuse material, not a counterterrorism issue. And so it is very confusing and upsetting. The other category, and the one that I perhaps worry about more from a counterterrorism standpoint, is what both you, Peter and Seamus mentioned, which is something called the true crime community. And this is basically an online space, an online culture that celebrates violent predecessors, school shooters, sometimes terrorists, lionizes them, and in the extreme cases, seeks to replicate them. So they will trace the kind of ideological or radicalization pathways of an individual. They'll meticulously study their tactics targeting their acts of violence, and then they'll seek to copy them, or in the kind of crude online pilots that will seek to beat their high score or beat their kill count. Some of the more notorious incidents from this movement include the December 2024 Abundant Life School shooting in Madison, Wisconsin. She has become a bit of an exemplar, I think I would say she's. Today, with the exception of the Columbine shooters, she's probably the most significant figure in the true crime community. Obviously, she. She died Antioch High school in Nashville, January 2025. Annunciation Catholic Church shooting, August 2025 in Minneapolis and Evergreen High School, September 2025, Evergreen, Colorado. The Institute for Strategic Dialogue, which is a kind of a think tank and do tank in the extremism space. In October, they identified 16 attacks or plots, I think, since the beginning of 2024. Inspired by this true crime community, all targeting schools. And this was another point I tried to make in that lawfare piece that you mentioned, the idea that the violence that we're seeing, the violent tip of the spear of the nihilistic, violent extremist movement, has largely targeted schools. And that is, I think, a really important thing for us to consider from the law enforcement and the counterterrorism perspective as well.

[Seamus Hughes]

And Jacob might disagree with me on this, but I think they're targeting schools for two reasons. One is that's the age demographic of the shooters, right? So they're in the schools. They understand the schools and things like that. But probably more important than all of that is that a lot of these folks look at this and say, okay, if I commit a school shooting, it's more likely to get as much publicity, much more publicity than if I committed an attack in a mall, right? Because it focuses on the most vulnerable of it. And there is a trolling aspect of this, right? So if you look at the kind of manifestos of the school shooters, a lot of them will copy and paste the last guy's manifesto, right?

[Jacob Ware]

Or.

[Seamus Hughes]

And then you'll see ones that are completely kind of have disparate ideological beliefs, right? So in one sentence, they'll talk about how important gun rights are. In the second one, they'll talk about how everyone should have all their guns taken away. And some of that is just entirely set up to upset the system, right? In order to get the right and the left on X or blue sky or whatever to say, oh, that's your guy. It's not our guy. Because, see, that. That page of that manifesto, and this is your problem. You need to figure it out. It's trying to get as much energy and eyeballs on it, right? And so, you know, this. This idea that Jacob talked about of, like, running up the score, it's a level of kind of trying to get infamy, but also just a general online trolling aspect taken to the worst possible extreme.

[Peter Beck]

So a bit on that note, is there an ideological cohesion to it all, or is it just kind of this hodgepodge and the people who are doing it? I know that you mentioned that they were younger, but is there any kind of other baseline factor that brings people together?

[Seamus Hughes]

Maybe this could be a part where Jacob and I would disagree. I don't know. We actually haven't talked about this yet. For the most part, I think violence is the ideology, right? Or this idea of accelerationism to the point of ruining society. Here's my caveat on this is that, and I think what we're seeing now is they may start with no ideology or violence being the ideology, but as they get farther and farther into the online space, the they come across the latest the Turner Diaries or whatever ISIS propaganda they look at and they glom onto it at the end. Right. It's almost like they started the violence and then end their way to ideology in some ways of it. And they're just kind of picking and choosing this. Listen, the ideology is almost a simple one, which is nothing matters on this because the world is absolutely jacked up and we can do whatever we want because it doesn't matter anymore. Nothing's going to change unless we do something. And if we do something, if it changes, all the better. But if it doesn't, who cares? Right? It's a level of extremity of it and it really kind of the lack of the ideology or the coherent ideology I guess is what I would say makes it very difficult. Jacob talked about this kind of bureaucratic buckets that we have into and that's true in academia, but it's absolutely true within law enforcement and the intelligence community. Right. We've got a team that does ISIS and they know to look for Anwar Locke and things like that. And we have a team that does racially motivated violent extremism and they know to look for 88 and we have a team that does incels, they know to look for Chads and Stacy's. And so if you put all our guys in these silos, when you're tracking a case of a 18 year old who's in this community and they're pulling all of those things, you may not understand that 88 is important and you may not understand that Chad is important because you haven't been trained and spent the last 10 years studying those type of things. The other aspect that's problematic too is that a lot of these folks that are doing this are focusing on people that are under the age of 18 as victims. Right. So exploitation of people as young as six or things like that. And so we have folks, the folks that are investing in them are going to be counterterrorism professionals. Those counterterrorism professionals understand how to interview a 25 year old who's thinking about blowing up a car bomb at the Mall of America. They probably haven't been trained on how to interview a six year old kid on the trauma and things that involve in that. So it requires a level of resources and bringing in different folks into this data set into the, into this response in a way that counterterrorism hasn't traditionally done.

[Jacob Ware]

Just a couple of points in addition there, Petra. I don't think I disagree with anything. I think one of the. One of the things that's been interesting to me studying NVE is I think they are, in certain respects, they're an exemplar of several trends that are happening more broadly across the extremes of space. Some of those are easy, right? Online radicalization, that's clearly at play here. Youth radicalization is clearly at play here. As Seamus was just talking about. A lot of the cases that we're dealing with are minors. Ideological convergence is at play. The concept of ideologies blurring becoming less important, groups becoming less important. We can talk about that a little bit more. The one I would just add on to that is the one that's very difficult to talk about, which is kind of the rise of mental illness in extremism and radicalization, and especially in this case, suicidality. Most of the cases that we've seen here, especially the violent cases, the four I discussed a second ago, they all ended in suicide. And that is a major factor. In the last question, Seamus was talking a bit about some of the reasons why schools are targeted. I would just add another one. Again, it was part of what I was trying to argue. When comparing NVE's to school shooters and incels, within the individual stories, you often see tales of isolation, loneliness, bullying, romantic frustration, violence in the home, sometimes substance abuse, and sometimes broader kind of mental. Mental illness. Each of those things, especially the first points, isolation, loneliness, history of being bullied. I think those lend themselves to school targeting as well, because much like, you know, the narratives from Virginia Tech, much like the narratives from Sandy Hook, Uvalde, right, The major school shootings in our country's history, these individuals are talking about revenge. They're talking about revenge against society, against those who wronged them, against those who excluded them, including sexually, much like the incels were, much like school shooters always have. Those narratives are reemerging here. And that's why I think it's important that we don't necessarily just reinvent the wheel in the counterterrorism space and think, oh, we've got this new term now we can finally understand these movements. Instead, NVE is, if anything, just giving a name to violence that we've always experienced, but have usually just kind of dismissed or degraded as meaningless. Right now, we don't think it's meaningless anymore because now we have a term for it. But in fact, we've seen this story, we've seen this story before. It's a counterfactual. But it's interesting to think of if we had a term like nihilistic violent extremism at the time of the Columbine shootings, which ended in suicide, Virginia Tech, which ended in suicide, Sandy Hook, which ended in suicide. It's interesting to think of whether we would consider those attacks back then as being nihilistic violent extremists. The last point I'll make here is the incels. They used to very eagerly kind of anoint their predecessors into their kind of pantheon of heroes. All right? They would say, oh, he was an incel, he was a hero. You know, the Sandy Hook shooter, for example, being a good example of somebody who was kind of posthumously brought into that movement and celebrated as one of their own. And the nves are doing that as well, chiefly with Columbine. But it's the same kind of concept of we recognize our predecessors, those who felt like we did, who acted like we did, we celebrate them, we try to emulate them. And that is why we're seeing the violence at the schools, I believe.

[Peter Beck]

So on the one hand, NVEs seem like a threat to public safety and it's certainly a child exploitation, child safety concern. But on the other hand, when we think about terrorism and we think about terrorist groups, they usually have an ideology, right? So even the Zizians who are a little bit more bizarre, it's a left wing terror group who thinks that AI is going to end humanity and therefore they need to take accelerationist tactics. But NVs don't have an ideology. That's why they're NBEs. Why should they be considered terrorism? And why should a group like 764 be considered a terrorist group rather than a cult hell bent on violence or more of this child exploitation concern?

[Seamus Hughes]

The way I would look at it is there's a level of pattern and structure to it that I don't think you can dismiss as just kind of a series of one offs in there, right? In that. Take a group like 764 which has steps of joining so you're in the lowest level. You commit a horrible act of violence against a child. It goes into a lore book which then you use to get into the next level in the Telegram channel and so on and so forth until you move up to the kind of leadership structure of it all. And so there's a command structure in this. I don't think you kind of dismiss it as a cult. You know, it's hard, you Know, we ideally want to be able to, like, pinpoint, okay, this is what they believe as an ideology and this is what they want to the things. But I would argue, like, this is almost like an ISIS type of group without the kind of political dynamics of it all. But in many ways, kind of overthrowing the government or overthrowing society in general is a political means. Right? So it falls into that category. I would also say that, like, unless you kind of categorized it as that, my concern at the US government level is that it would not be taken with the level of vigor that one needs to on that. So, you know, academics may quibble on it, but when you look at kind of the way the US Government's set up and the way the counterterrorism is set up, like those categorizations actually do matter quite a bit. There's also kind of the international dynamics of it all too. Right. So it's not, this is not just happening in the US You've got arrests that are happening in Europe and the Middle east and Australia and New Zealand and Canada. The Canadians and the New Zealand have designated this as a terrorism organization. So we'll see how this plays out as it goes on.

[Jacob Ware]

Peter, could I let your readers in on a secret? Professor Hughes was actually my. A professor of mine at Georgetown when I was a grad student, he taught a class called Homegrown Radicalization and Terrorist Recruitment, I think. And in that week we had, in that semester, I think we had at least two weeks looking at just radicalization theory. And my takeaway from those two weeks was, wow, we really don't have good radicalization theories because they all contradict and none of them are perfect. There's no kind of everybody wants to find the conveyor belt theory that says, oh, this is how somebody gets on at the start, this is how they come off at the end. Because the point being then we could stop it. What I would say with regards to NV is I welcome the term. I hope we don't try to over classify. It's not necessarily that important. I think it's important for resourcing, it's important for prioritization. But it's important too to know that we're very confused all across the board by this movement and we don't want to let them fall through the cracks. One of the cases I've really spoken about a lot with regards to NV relates to something that happened in the UK actually in a place called Southport in the north, north of England in 2024, where a 17 year old, walked into a Taylor Swift themed dance class and murdered three young girls under the age of 10. I believe the three girls who were killed were stabbed cumulatively 200 times. This was a deeply homicidal person. And the UK, interestingly enough, had actually been way ahead of the US in terms of trying to understand these what they called mixed, unclear and unstable ideologies. They had new categories within their counter extremism networks. They were thinking of it way more sophisticated than we were. And yet this individual was referred to the counterextremism programs several times and slipped through the cracks because they just couldn't categorize him, because he was driven by homicidal mania that he had found online rather than any kind of ideology. I don't want us to think this is a term that's perfect and catch all and all these cases will fit here and we'll be able to prioritize and be able to target it and everything will be fine. Because what I've learned in my career studying extremism and terrorism is they are always one step ahead of us. They'll always find a way of kind of skirting around those boundaries. And we have to be able to think much more flexibly, I think, about the threats we face, the ideologies we face, the online networks. That is how I think we'll be able to get ahead of it rather than thinking, okay, 764 is now categorized as a terrorist actor or a terrorist group and true crime community. We're going to target them with resources. We just have to be much more flexible.

[Sponsor - Bill.com]

This episode is brought to you by Bill, the intelligent finance platform that helps businesses and accounting firms scale with proven results. When you're growing a business, the stakes get higher. You can't afford infrastructure that breaks under pressure. If you care about security, reliability and scale, I want to let you in on a secret. Bill is the foundational software that nearly half a million businesses and 90 of the top 100 US accounting firms used to automate back office workflows, add secure controls to payment processes and scale without increased overhead. With AI powered accounts payable automation, Bill erases the busy work from capturing invoices, routing approvals and processing payments, syncing seamlessly with the top accounting software platforms so your books are always accurate. But Bill isn't just accounts payable. It supports the full payments workflow. Bill has processed over $1 trillion in transactions, leveraging that expertise to help you manage, move and maximize your finances. So stop the guesswork and start scaling with the proven choice. Go to Bill, dot com proven to talk with a payments expert and get a $250 gift card as a thank you. That's Bill.com proven terms and conditions apply. See Offer page for details.

[Sponsor - Bombas/Warby Parker/Equip Health]

Thank you for calling the Bombas Comfort line. Bombas make socks, slippers, tees and underwear made with the highest quality materials. Press 1 for comfort, 2 for style, 3 for donation. You chose Style. Bombas is Style's for whatever you enjoy. You can run in Bombas, lounge in Bombas, dress them up, dress them down, but always give back in Bombas because with every item purchased, another is donated Bombas Comfort. Worth calling for? Go to bombas.com audio and use code audio for 20% off your first purchase. That's B O-M-B-A-.com and use code audio. Every idea starts with a problem. Warby Parker's was simple. Glasses are too expensive. So they set out to change that. By designing glasses in house and selling directly to customers, they're able to offer prescription eyewear that's expertly crafted and unexpectedly affordable. Warby Parker glasses are made from premium materials like impact resistant polycarbonate and custom acetate, and they start at just $95, including prescription lenses. Get glasses made from the good stuff. Stop by a Warby Parker store near you. We live in a culture obsessed with dieting, weight loss and exercise, and that can make eating disorder behaviors easy to miss. But the reality is, eating disorders are serious mental illnesses that take a major toll on your health and your life. But recovery is possible. Eating disorders are more common than you might think. Chances are you know someone who is struggling with one, or maybe you're struggling yourself. If you're concerned about an eating disorder in yourself or a loved one, I want to introduce you to equipment. Equip is a fully virtual evidence based eating disorder treatment program that helps patients achieve lasting recovery at home. Every Equip patient is matched with a multidisciplinary care team that includes a therapist, dietitian, medical provider and mentors, and you get a personalized treatment plan that's tailored to your unique goals and challenges. Equip treats patients of all ages and all eating disorder diagnoses. It's covered by insurance and there's no wait list. If you think that you or a loved one could be struggling with an eating disorder, don't wait to get help.

[Seamus Hughes]

Help.

[Sponsor - Bombas/Warby Parker/Equip Health]

Visit Equip Health to learn more. That's Equip Health.

[Peter Beck]

So obviously in this context and lawfare listeners will be aware, there is this heightened concern around the use of domestic terrorism Terms, particularly within the FBI. Antifa has been a big topic of conversation recently and how the Justice Department and FBI label people as domestic terrorists and antifa. What's concerning about NVS is that when you're applying this very broad term to people, that NVS doesn't mean anything. And so you can kind of stick it on anyone because its whole purpose is that it covers this broad area of cases that the Bureau couldn't cover previously. Jacob, is that a concern of yours?

[Jacob Ware]

Yes and no. You know, when the NVE term first emerged, it was met with a lot of pushback, I think, in the kind of counterterrorism research community, because, you know, a lot of people felt that this was going to be used to distract from the fact that something called racially and ethnically motivated violent extremism, or remvi, which is really white supremacy and black supremacy, was the predominant threat. And you saw that a little bit in that first case I mentioned where the individual was driven to try to spark a race war, and clearly investigators made a decision to investigate or prosecute him as a nihilist, not a racially and ethnically motivated violent extremist. I'm not sure that's correct. At the same time, I welcome a more ambitious, I think, again, attempt to classify incidents that have been around for a long time that we haven't necessarily been able to meaningfully classify and understand. I think it's good that we try to think a little bit more broadly. I think it's good that we think outside the box and we're a bit more flexible. I'm not sure, Peter, how much actual legal strength this. This category has. I mean, I'd be interested to hear Seamus's thoughts. You know, my understanding in all the work I've ever done on domestic terrorism, which has been quite a lot, is that there is no federal domestic terrorism charge. Now, I know the government is. There is no domestic terrorism category that has kind of groups associated with it. So the administration is attempting to use domestic terrorism tools against antifa. You know, I have been unable to run to ground what that actually means legally because. And it's always been my understanding that doesn't exist. And so as far as I'm concerned, I think NVE is more of an investigative tool. It's more of how we conceptualize incidents, how we conceptualize 764, how we conceptualize the true crime community, how we connect them to their predecessors, and how we can then resource effectively to target actors, rather than a hard and fast kind of, this is the law and this is the law that they're breaking. Seamus, am I wrong there?

[Seamus Hughes]

No, no, I think you're absolutely right. So, I mean, I, I would understand those concerns of kind of this mixing or this expansion of domestic terrorism categorizations maybe a year ago. Right. And you saw the term nihilistic violent extremism being thrown onto right wing extremism, left wing extremism, all hosts of cases. I think we've leveled out now. I think the Trump administration, if they believe that someone is, for lack of a better word, antifa, they'll just say antifa now. Right. And I think if they. And we saw that in the Prairie Land trial that's happening right now, they're not mincing words on that. Right. I think it's fair to say now, if they're talking about nihilistic violent extremism, whether the bureau or law enforcement, they're really talking about a discrete set of actors. Right. These are individuals tend to be younger, tend to be targeting children, tend to be interested in mass shootings and things like that, and less of a kind of a. A Trojan horse for a larger question about whether we should designate left wing or right wing extremism groups. I think it's kind of a distinct thing now. And so I have less concerns than I did prior.

[Jacob Ware]

One of the issues too, Peter, just, just frankly is, you know, because again, I know I've mentioned it several times, but the true crime community cases that have really dominated the debate, they have ended in suicide. There is no big criminal case against the Annunciation shooter. That individual is interesting because on their firearms they had both the terms kill Donald Trump, and 6 million wasn't enough. So you have both statements of what you might call far left extremism and statements of far right kind of neo Nazi extremism. Neither of them would be the way we would investigate that case. Presumably, we would investigate it on a nihilistic angle, but there's no criminal case. So we haven't had those real tests as well.

[Seamus Hughes]

And I think that may shift. There's been some percolations within the administration. This idea of designating 764 at the state Department, given its international links. Now, that is a completely different conversation than we're having now. Right. So that opens up a whole host of kind of material support charges that you may be able to bring. You know, usually the past designation of groups that had some touch point to the US Were organizations like the Nordic Resistance Movement, which had really no real movement in the US if they did do a designation of 764 for an overseas designation of it. It does have US ramifications very quickly. And so that I think is where we discuss like is this actually terrorism? Does it fit in the traditional definition, things like that. But it also, to be fair, also opens up a whole host of new law enforcement tools and techniques.

[Peter Beck]

So among the cases that have wound up in federal court, especially with 764, Seamus, what tools have you seen prosecutors use?

[Seamus Hughes]

Yeah, so at nsyte, University of Nebraska Omaha at this research center called nsight and we have been tracking all of the federal prosecutions of true crime and calm. And 764, if you look at 764, I think we've had 35 federal arrests so far in the last year or so, 160 different charges. The vast majority of them are going to be some variation of child exploitation, so child pornography, trafficking of children, those type of things and then the occasional cyber stalking. And so the US Government largely basically looks at what they got on the shelf in terms of charges and then throws it at them that way. And it's not like a, we're going to bring a, a huge terrorism charge on this or things like that. Maybe they consider a RICO charge that they can here and there, but largely child exploitation. Right. And like some of the, I mean we talk, you want to talk about the egregious cases? Like the most recent, one most recent arrest was in California I think two or three weeks ago of a, I think he was 18, 19 year old guy who traveled to California, convince a 13 year old girl to go to a hotel that he had been communicating with for quite a while, sexually assaulted her and was planning to do a murder suicide over the hotel roof.

[Peter Beck]

Right.

[Seamus Hughes]

Really just egregious. Like the criminal complaint's really tough to read. Right. And but that's the general vibe of those cases, right. It's I made up individual carve a swastika into their body so I can show my friends how I have power over that individual or I made them murder their family pet because I've already got them so deep by sending explicit pictures they can't get out and there's no way for them to talk to their parents about what they're seeing on this. And so it's kind of a systematic level of depravity I think is, is, is a level of concern for me. Right. And we're seeing like a pretty large focus on it, on this idea of 764 and nihilistic violence extremism in the way we hadn't say seen in like 6 months ago. You are seeing JTTF stand ups, separate squads just for this. There is guidance going out more. I just want to kind of put it in the context of, you know, there's also a lot going on for the bureau at the time.

[Peter Beck]

Right.

[Seamus Hughes]

And we, you know, we're recording in the height of a Iran war and there's going to be other things that the FBI is looking at and moving a personnel or letting go of personnel. And so there's a lot of moving parts on these type of things. But there's a core group of fol, both within Main justice and FBI that are focusing on this and are doing really good work on it. One thing we haven't talked about, I think, which is quite important, is this idea of victims becoming perpetrators too. So if you look at some of the cases of individuals who have done these things, they were victims of these networks three or four years prior to that. And that makes it difficult. It doesn't necessarily make it difficult to prosecute, but it does make it difficult to decide if you want to prosecute or whether you should try a different way.

[Peter Beck]

Yeah. Jacob, do you want to add anything about that vicious cycle of abuse and also a little bit more about where exactly these groups operate?

[Jacob Ware]

Sure. Completely agree with what, with what Seamus said. I mean, you will hear, you know, it's kind of a lot of the buzz terminology that will come out of, of terrorism scholars, I find. But, but certainly the solution here is going to be more on the prevention side than on the, you know, counterterrorism law enforcement side. The more that we can educate, you know, parents and teachers and young people about, you know, the signs, you know, carvings, for example, that would indicate that we, you've got a problem in your family, the better. And I think that the earlier in a kind of radicalization trajectory, as you can call it that or mobilization trajectory, that we can intervene, the better. Because 764 especially is, I think, defined in a lot of ways by grooming processes that are happening. And when you have victims who are becoming perpetrators, I mean, it puts you in a very difficult ethical, moral position. With 764, you know, truly nobody in this case with extremism writ large often. But there are no winners here. Right. Nobody is triumphing over anybody else. Everybody here is, or the vast majority are victims as well as perpetrators. And the more that we can get ahead of that, the better in terms of the networks, unfortunately, what I have seen is often this starts with the more mainstream platforms Places like, you know, Telegram, Discord, Roblox. Yeah, Roblox. And oftentimes, you know, it might begin with an individual, a young individual, teenager or younger, who's expressing some kind of vulnerability. And that can be as simple as, I'm really struggling to make friends in my new school, or I don't understand why, why everybody in my community hates me, or I don't understand my gender identity. That is then preyed on by these actors who identify that this is somebody who I can coerce and control. And then that escalates into the things that Seamus and I have discussed already. Right, that, that ritualized child sexual exploitation in order to be something that can be celebrated by the group, in order to be something that can build clout among the actors who are extracting these, these photographs, these videos. In the worst cases, that particular process will be fatal. Fatal to the individual who's being victimized or fatal to somebody in the family, a pet, for example. I guess in the better cases, if you can call it that, again, there are no winners here, but I guess in the better cases, the victims will survive. Those interactions might either seek help or might end up back into the movement the faster, the earlier that we can get into these spaces and kind of interdict these processes, the better. But that is extremely difficult. And I think, as Seamus could tell you far better than I can, we have been tracing prevention and countering violence extremism for 25 years now. And we failed to build the infrastructure, we failed to build the sustainable kind of processes that can protect our young people. And this is just another case where they are being victimized and suffering for that.

[Seamus Hughes]

And I would add too, on this question of prevention. So if you look at the national center for Missing Exploited Children, they ran the numbers for us last week and I think they had, Let me look 2000 reports in the last year involving 764. And what I thought was most interesting about their data is at least half of those reports came from victims themselves, meaning that they were proactively reaching out to national center for Missing and Exploited Children, saying, like, listen, I don't know what I'm doing. I can't call my family. There is no support line for this. You all are the only ones left. And that's a reflection of a government decision and a society decision to not prioritize prevention as an effect on this.

[Peter Beck]

So several of 764's leaders, including, I believe his name is Bradley Cadenhead, who 764 is named after, that's his phone zip code. Several of its leaders have been arrested. Have we seen the group kind of toned down at all with this increased focus from law enforcement?

[Seamus Hughes]

I would say Kaden had arrest didn't really affect the system. In fact, I think it just kind of set a motion on it. But there were a few, two major arrests by the FBI last year of leadership within the organization that did actually affect a little bit in the short term, the ability to kind of push out their lore books and their telegram channels and things like that. So in many ways it's an online group that is kind of decentralized, things like that. But there is a central hierarchy system in some respects, particularly as a group like 764 where you got kind of move up the ranks in the lore books. And so a increased focus on again we say leaders, but we're talking about leaders being 17 year old kids. If we focus on those leaders, it will probably have an effect on the rest of the network.

[Jacob Ware]

The counterargument would be these are cultural phenomenon now. And764 I think is the true crime community certainly is not unlike other extremist networks from ISIS to antifa to white supremacy, where you have these robust online ecosystems and there are leaders. But the reality is the violence that we see in our communities almost always in America these days is lone act of violence. And so you can go after leaders all you want, but until you can confidently kind of break the pathway that somebody's on from being exposed to extremist content and then determining that they're going to get commit an act of violence on behalf of that extremist ideology, you're not going to be any closer to keeping our communities safe. Again, I think part of the challenge with this conversation is realistically the dynamics, the differences between 764 and the true crime community are vast in a lot of ways. So there's not going to be one perf, there's not going to be one counterterrorism recommendation you would make that would say, hey, this is going to fix the problem. It's a lot more dynamic than that. That's why people like Seamus and I relentlessly talk about prevention, because you just have to find a way to keep people out of these networks in the first place. Once they're on the trajectory, it becomes much harder.

[Peter Beck]

So this has been a pretty dark conversation. I can't think of any darker cases happening on the federal level that I've read than 7, 6, 4 and NVS. I'm curious if either one of you have anything that you're hopeful about.

[Jacob Ware]

I'll give you one, Peter. I don't know if I'm hopeful about it, but I'm intrigued by it. One of my great frustrations as somebody who has spent my entire professional career kind of looking at the worst of the Internet on a daily basis, you know, I've come to the. To the conclusion that, you know, social media companies are probably not a force for good. And I think since Elon Musk's takeover of Twitter and then his kind of leadership in the administration, I think most American social media companies have actually moved in a direction of less moderation than more moderation. And I would argue that's not a good thing for the kind of conversation we're having today. But a lot of our allied countries are preparing to take a much harder stance on that. So Australia, for instance, has passed a ban or is in the process of passing a ban on social media for people under 16. That is a really, really remarkable step. And I'm not confident on how it will play out, whether it'll be a good thing or a bad thing. But I am glad that somebody's going to test that out, see whether they can better protect younger people through just literally removing them from these battlefields, removing them from the exposure to nihilists, for example. Part of what online radicalization does, it has completely violated the protective barriers that we used to erect around vulnerable young people, whether it was their parents or sports coaches or teachers or counselors or music coaches. All of those protective factors have been completely violated now. And at some point, as a society, we have to think about what it's going to mean to put those back in place because we're losing our youth. Australia is one example, just very quickly. Another one is there was a remarkable speech given. I think it was earlier this year, but it might have been in November or December by the French President Emmanuel Macron, where he spoke about how American social media companies and Chinese social media companies were now posing a threat to European teenagers and to European democracy. Again, that is a remarkable statement from one of our closest allies to compare us to China in terms of the effects we're having on European teenagers. So there is a reckoning coming between American social media companies and our allied countries. I don't know how it will play out, but I welcome the conversation. I think it's an important one.

[Seamus Hughes]

Let me add one. I don't even know how to describe this as hopeful, but let's just talk about it. A group like 764, if you look at, like the debate on antifa designation or whatever they did on that, or right wing extremism or Islamist extremism. There are going to be pockets of people that are pushing back on that or seeing it as government overreach and all the variety of things. A group like 764, the combination that is one that can actually bring together all different sides because it's protecting children, right? They are targeting the most vulnerable of society and it can cross party lines and polarization in a way that I don't think any other issue on the counterterrorism spectrum ever could before. And so I am hopeful that this actually might be a place where we can kind of rally together as a country and say enough is enough.

[Jacob Ware]

Completely agree.

[Peter Beck]

Well, we'll leave it at that. Thank you so much for joining me.

[Jacob Ware]

Thank you so much for having me.

[Peter Beck]

The Lawfare Podcast is produced by the Lawfare Institute. If you want to support the show and listen ad free, you can become a Lawfare material [e-mail] support supporters also get access to special events and other bonus content we don't share anywhere else. If you enjoy the podcast, please rate and review us wherever you listen. It really does help. And be sure to check out our other shows, including Rational Security, Allies, the Aftermath and Escalation, our latest Lawfare Presents podcast series about the war in Ukraine. You can also find all of our written [e-mail] the podcast is edited by Genpatia with audio engineering by Kara Schillen of Goat Rodeo. Our theme music is from Alibi Music and as always, thanks for listening.

[Jacob Ware]

With its two juicy beef patties, three slices of melted cheese and tangy Big Arch sauce.

[Seamus Hughes]

The Big Arch is what happens when

[Jacob Ware]

you start making a McDonald's burger and never stop. The Big Arch, the most McDonald's McDonald's burger yet for a limited time.