Albeit under tight siege there is widespread and growing internet and computer literacy among the Palestinians in the Gaza Strip. This situation has made the Israeli intelligence services feel tempted to employ extortion methods on the web to obtain information from citizens.
In order to confront cyber dangers from Israeli sources the Palestinian Ministry of Interior and National Security in Gaza has launched a special awareness campaign called “the Awakening Campaign” in order to warn the citizens about the gravity of their exposure to extortion on the web by Israelis and how to deal with it.
The campaign is being supervised by the women police department in cooperation with the Culture and Free Thought Association in Gaza.
Director of the women police Nariman Adwan said that the campaign has an educational purpose intended for raising the awareness of families about the dangers of cyber extortion and explaining its causes methods consequences and how to confront and deal with it.
Adwan added that the campaign would also help in camera those who fell victim to Israeli extortion on the web.
“The Internet is a fertile ground for the activity of the [Israeli] occupation intelligence and has become one of the most important arenas of recruitment and information obtainment and as a result of difficult political situations we see young people escape from their real societies to the virtual society on social medial websites to find harmony with others and forget disturbing things according to their views” the police officer opined.
The campaign’s objectives
According to Adwan the campaign will focus on females because most of extortion incidents on the Internet happen to girls who are considered the weaker side in the extortionist’s view although the efforts in this regard will target all sections of the society in Gaza.
The campaign will provide safe routes for victims of cyber extortion as well as educational information about the dangers resulting from getting involved in suspicious activities on the Internet and how to act after facing or dealing with threats and snares from foreign elements.
As part of this campaign extortion victims will also find a friendly environment embracing them with no psychological or security pressures.
The campaign aims to encourage the victims to break the barrier of fear and address the problem they may face through the official channels and to provide every legal and psychological support for them.
Adwan pointed out that the women police offices throughout Gaza are one of the channels of communication in addition to the general investigation department and its technical sources section which is responsible for tackling cybercrimes.
Extortion victims can reach the competent authorities through the official campaign page or the campaign cellphone number “0595538723” or contact a trusted person close to or from a security apparatus.
The women police chief affirmed that the security authorities would confidentially handle all cases that take advantage of the campaign.
