GIFCT is a 501(c)(3) non-profit organization and a unique tech-led initiative fostering multi-stakeholder collaboration to identify effective solutions and tools to address global challenges at the intersection of terrorism and technology.

Since its inception, GIFCT has grown from 4 founding member companies to more than 35 tech companies who have committed to our mission.

The Campaign Toolkit provides resources and guidance for individuals and organizations looking to take action against terrorism and violent extremism online. The  website is designed to be a one-stop shop for resources and tools to help activists make a difference, regardless of their level of expertise. Whether you are an individual, a non-profit organization, or an advocacy group, the Campaign Toolkit has a range of resources to help you get inspired, develop, launch, and evaluate your online efforts.

The Campaign Toolkit is a free resource for individuals and organizations looking to create and deploy online campaigns against terrorism and violent extremism. It is intended as a starting point or a guide for those interested in developing and running social good campaigns online. The Toolkit is designed to be user-friendly and accessible to everyone engaged in activism efforts.

Explore the Campaign Toolkit and start driving change today.

to facilitate dialogue, foster understanding, and produce outputs to directly support our mission of preventing terrorists and violent extremists from exploiting digital platforms across a range of sectors, geographies, and disciplines.

GIFCT Working Groups contribute to growing our organizational capacity to deliver guidance and solutions to technology companies and practitioners working to counter terrorism and violent extremism, and offer multi-stakeholder perspectives on critical challenges and opportunities.

Explore practical resources on audience targeting, messaging, social media, advocacy, and campaign evaluation - helping you set goals, craft counter-narratives, ensure safety, and measure impact for stronger, more effective strategic communication.

Explore practical resources on audience targeting, messaging, social media, advocacy, and campaign evaluation—helping you set goals, craft counter-narratives, ensure safety, and measure impact for stronger, more effective strategic communication.

Campaign Development Resources

Discover inspiring organizations and campaigns tackling online harms. This section highlights key examples, provides useful links, and refines filters for easier navigation—helping you explore approaches that drive meaningful change.

Inspiring Organizations

Use our campaign planning template to structure strategies, content, and evaluation. Simplify your process with guided steps and resources—designed to support effective planning without requiring interactive tools.

PLAN YOUR CAMPAIGN

Whether you are an activist, an NGO, a city official, or a practitioner in the field, this tool is for you. This set of problems is too big for any one actor to solve alone. It takes a whole community response to make a difference.

Computer Security

The checklist below provides an overview of some key elements to consider to enhance your campaign's security. This list is not comprehensive and cannot replace a tailored risk assessment. Each campaign presents a specific set of challenges which depend on your target audience, country of operation, and area of work.

Phone Security

Staff Security

If your campaign becomes targeted by a contrary audience, is hijacked by a malicious group, or faces any form of crisis – be it online harassment, threats, or trolling – there are a number of steps you can take to address the situation:

Threat Response

setting long-term objectives, mapping pathways of change, and aligning tactics with goals.

training in framing, storytelling, and narrative techniques to avoid reinforcing harmful tropes. The

practical skills in petitions, letter-writing, and lobbying adapted to prevention contexts.

protecting identities and infrastructure against harassment or attack.

building indicators to measure the effectiveness of advocacy tactics, drawing on resources such as the

follow best practices on account protection, encryption, and safe storage. Resources such as

(Access Now/Tactical Tech) remain essential.

or the Coalition Against Online Violence's

survivors, formers, or other visible messengers must be supported with consent processes, takedown protocols, and psychosocial care.

advocacy is sustained work; schedule regular debriefs and access to counselling or peer-support networks.

Key elements to consider to

connect with civil society groups, educators, youth organizations, and faith communities. Campaigns rooted in genuine coalitions are harder to dismiss as being limited by a predominantly top-down approach.

adapt models from other advocacy fields, where long-term petitions, grassroots lobbying, and community mobilisation have shifted norms.

ensure women, young people, and minority groups are not simply represented but actively co-leading campaigns. Tokenism erodes trust; meaningful involvement strengthens it.

Collecting signatures for pledges of conduct (e.g., against online hate or disinformation) can anchor campaigns in visible, measurable commitments.

Community Pledges:

Campaigners can use petitions or letters to push for changes in platform policy or enforcement practices, linking local experiences of harm to global corporate responsibility

Direct Advocacy to Platforms:

Coordinated letters to policymakers, community leaders, or institutions can amplify voices. Best practice is to provide templates that supporters can adapt, balancing consistency with personal authenticity. This tactic works best when aligned with campaign peaks or policy moments.

Letter Writing:

Petitions can demonstrate visible support for change, particularly at local or institutional levels. They should be specific, time-bound, and linked to achievable actions. Platforms like Change.org or local civic portals can host campaigns, but practitioners should anticipate security risks (e.g., trolling, hostile encounters).

Petitions:

Coalitions can publish joint statements to show unity and legitimacy. These carry weight when signatories are diverse and represent different constituencies.

Statements & Open Letters:

organizations should ensure that staff are not harmed through their work and that risks are mitigated to the highest extent possible.

organizations should conduct a holistic risk assessment and management plan before engaging in a campaign. A risk assessment plan should include the likelihood of certain outcomes that may cause harm to staff and involved stakeholders.

RISK MANAGEMENT FRAMEWORK

A specific target and victim are explicitly identified by name;

Direct

Vague and non-specific threats where the author's intentions are not clear;

Indirect

Exposure to harmful content, experience of vicarious or secondary trauma; other threats caused by exposure of personally identifiable information.

Secondary

Threats vaguely implying a call for violence (e.g., shitposting and trolling);

Veiled

Audience Targeting

The information presented here is a brief overview of the complex landscape that makes up the field of preventing and countering violent extremism (PVE and CVE) online. Often, these online interventions can be referred to as counter-narratives, counter speech, alternative narratives, or positive interventions, depending on the ultimate goal for the online engagement. For more comprehensive guidance and in-depth analysis of positive interventions, we recommend consulting the outputs of the

Budget Setting

Defining your Expectations

Ethical Issues Around Targeting Vulnerable Audiences

determining the issue or challenge and understanding the root cause of the problem and contributing factors. Who do you want to reach to help fix that challenge or problem? That should help you determine who you want to reach.

Identification of a problem and who it involves -

When information mining reveals opportunities for engagement, it is important to provide content that can trigger a positive shift in people's thinking. By using subtle entry points, such as building trust and engagement, it may be possible to encourage critical thinking and foster a sustained shift away from hate-based or violent extremist ideologies.

Identifying the objectives and goals of an online campaign is the first step in developing a successful and impactful intervention. Setting realistic, achievable, and clear objectives helps ensure that a campaign remains effective and measurable throughout its entire unfolding.

For a truly robust campaign plan, you should identify the specific tactics that will allow you to achieve your objectives. These are the "how" part of your campaign and should be both practical and logical.

Tactics

The Campaign Toolkit provides resources and guidance for individuals and organizations looking to take action against terrorism and violent extremism online. The website is designed to be a one-stop shop for resources and tools to help activists make a difference, regardless of their level of expertise. Whether you are an individual, a non-profit organization, or an advocacy group, the Campaign Toolkit has a range of resources to help you get inspired, develop, launch, and evaluate your online efforts.

Powered by the support of GIFCT funders, our work builds digital resilience, empowers communities, and counters extremism - uniting partners worldwide to create safer online spaces and inspire meaningful, positive change.

This toolkit is for changemakers—activists, NGOs, artists, educators, and community leaders—ready to inspire youth, challenge extremist narratives, and build resilience through creativity, culture, and collective action.

Get campaign-ready in no time! Follow these simple steps to design and launch a campaign tailored to your audience — clear, practical, and easy to execute.

Outline your Campaign's Goals and Objectives

Tailor the message for your Target Audience

Amplify your campaign with Social Media Tools and Guides

Learn how to advocate safely and effectively

Monitor and Evaluate your campaign

The Campaign Toolkit was initially developed in partnership with the Institute for Strategic Dialogue and we are grateful for their contributions. As the project has evolved, GIFCT has taken full ownership for the ongoing development and maintenance of the site. GIFCT remains committed to providing high-quality resources and tooling to activists combatting online hate and violent extremism around the world.

Developed in Partnership with

In the digital age, extremist and hate-driven ideologies spread faster than ever, fueling division and mistrust. Yet the voices that can make the greatest impact often go unheard. That's why we need accessible tools, guidance, and real-world examples in one place - empowering people to push back against harmful narratives. While focused on extremism, our toolkit can also help tackle other online harms like misinformation and polarization.

Together, we can...

Messaging is the bridge between understanding your audience and creating content that can influence them. It is not enough to simply have a good idea; the message must be clear in its purpose, credible in its delivery, adapted to the right medium, and connected to an achievable next step.  In preventing and countering violent extremism (PVE and CVE) contexts, the clarity, authenticity, and tone are crucial in giving your message the best chances of landing.

EFFECTS

END-STATE

MEASUREMENT

OBJECTIVES

STRATEGY & TACTICS

Best practice is to let audience research guide the choice of medium.

Measurability:

Provide moral legitimacy and can align prevention with faith-based values. Use existing community channels and avoid sectarian framing. Include a range of intra- and inter-faith voices to incorporate diverse perspectives.

Faith Leaders

Bring credibility from lived experience inside violent extremist groups. Best practice is to co-create content with them, focus on specific lessons, and connect to clear exit pathways. Avoid retraumatisation and harassment.

Formers

Musicians, creators, gamers, or peers can deliver prevention messages in authentic formats. Allow creative freedom, keep asks small and clear, and avoid overt "counter-extremism" branding.

Influencers and Peers

Communicate urgency and human cost. Prioritise dignity and resilience, ensure survivors control their story, and provide support. Avoid hostile exposure or retraumatisation.

Survivors

Often underrepresented but can be highly credible in family, school, and community contexts. Highlight women as leaders and role models, not only as victims. Prepare for potential harassment and avoid tokenism.

Women

What is your external message?

What do you want your audience to do with the message?

What is the campaign slogan?

What hashtags will you use for your campaign? And what hashtags might you co-opt?

Highlighting positive visions of identity and belonging, showing what you are for rather than what you are against (e.g., youth campaigns celebrating culture, sport, or creativity).

Alternative Narratives

Directly challenging violent extremist claims and discrediting harmful ideologies (e.g., formers exposing manipulation inside violent extremist groups).

Counter Narratives

Raising awareness or correcting misinformation (e.g., clarifying myths about perpetrators of terrorist attacks).

Strategic Communications

Evaluation tools are crucial for advocacy campaigns as they allow organizers to measure the impact and effectiveness of their efforts. By using these tools, campaigners can identify areas for improvement and make necessary adjustments to ensure their message is reaching their intended audience and achieving their desired outcomes.

Online positive interventions posit certain assumptions about both the intervention's role and potential attitudinal and behavioral impact on often hard-to-reach audiences with diverse levels of vulnerability and disparities in their access to information.

your campaign

Monitor & Evaluate

Relying solely on online reach data can create skewed notions of audiences and their needs. Online engagement, such as likes and shares, may not accurately reflect an individual's values, preferences, or position on a subject matter. Therefore, it is important to go beyond reach and focus on active communication that elicits a response beyond pressing "like." In the terrorism and violent extremism space, prebunking-based interventions are becoming more and more popular.

 takes an inoculation theory approach and focuses on prevention rather than cure. It aims to build mental armor by preparing individuals to identify, assess, and make informed choices when violent extremist content appears on their screen or social media feed.

Debunking-based efforts can struggle to match the quantity and propensity of violent extremist content, which is why

By showing individuals enough examples of violent extremist-based content through pre-bunking tactics, they become better equipped to identify and question it.

UNDERMINING

BEHAVIOR CHANGE

QUANTITATIVE METRICS

QUALITATIVE

How do you know your effot is/was successful?

IMPACT

Impact indicators are how you will analyze, on an ongoing basis, whether your tactics are allowing your campaign to reach its objectives.

Examples:

Is your audience watching your videos for long enough, or do they need to be edited? Is your audience engaging with your message, or do you need to change or adapt the message? Are people responding positively to your events, or do you need to change the format?

For Example:

As your campaign is being delivered, continued monitoring of the impact indicators will let you know whether or not you need to alter anything within your campaign. For example:

What decisive conditions need to be evidenced?

Best Practices to Follow:

Privacy concerns arise when personal information - such as names, contact details, or online activities - is collected, stored, or analyzed without appropriate consent or safeguards. Activists may face risks of exposure, harassment, or surveillance by unauthorized actors or authorities who gain access to monitored data. Additionally, the aggregation and analysis of data collected through monitoring can potentially lead to profiling, discrimination, or the infringement of individual rights. Beyond the different legal frameworks on data protection applicable to each jurisdiction, it is important to note that activists should consider adopting a privacy-preserving approach whenever possible.

. Personally Identifiable Information (PII) refers to any data that can be used to identify an individual, such as a name, email address, phone number, IP address, etc. Treat any information that could reveal someone's identity as highly sensitive.

Handle personal information carefully

Gather the minimum amount of information required to measure your campaign's objectives, and avoid collecting unnecessary personal data.

Collect only what you need.

 When gathering feedback or survey responses, clearly explain what data is being collected, how it will be used, and for how long it will be stored.

Be transparent and obtain consent.

 Use password protection, encryption, and multi-factor authentication for internal systems that store sensitive campaign data. Limit access only to staff who need the data for monitoring or evaluation.

Store and share data securely.

 Establish clear timelines for deleting or archiving campaign data when it is no longer needed, i.e., a certain period of time after the campaign is completed and all reporting has been submitted.

Set a deletion plan.

Privacy Considerations

Ongoing Monitoring

Post - Campaign Evaluation

An important step towards creating a successful campaign is the testing or pilot phase aimed at identifying strengths, weaknesses, challenges, and nuances. This phase can involve focus group discussions and A/B testing, which render different versions of the same content to similar audiences to test reactions. An iterative approach that is open to feedback from the sample audience can also provide nuanced results.

This section focuses on defining the campaign's core purpose and target.

This section focuses on the materials used to deliver the message.

The toolkit breaks the campaign planning process into three main sections: Strategy, Content, and Promotion and Evaluation.

Specific resources are provided to help you utilize the Twitter platform for advertising.

This final section covers distribution and measuring success.

Campaign Description: What the campaign is about.

Match the content format to your target audience, message, budget, and safety considerations.

Test content with your audience and refine based on feedback.

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This privacy policy may change from time to time in line with legislation or industry developments. GIFCT will not explicitly inform clients or website users of these changes. They recommend checking this page occasionally for any policy changes.

Along with business and internal computer systems, this website complies with the following legislation regarding data protection and user privacy:

GIFCT will report any unlawful data breach of the website's database or third-party processor databases to all relevant persons and authorities within 72 hours if it's apparent that personal data stored in an identifiable manner has been stolen.

The data controller is: GIFCT, a 501(c)3 not-for-profit headquartered in the United States.

Lisa Biancalana

Director of Operations

Third party data processors have been carefully chosen and all comply with relevant legislation. All are based in the USA and are EU-U.S Privacy Shield compliant (Google).

Campaign Toolkit Privacy Policy

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It is fundamental that practitioners become digitally literate and acquire the necessary skills to interact with their digital native target groups. GIFCT member companies provide various resources to support advocates and organizations in developing and enhancing digital skills.

Whether you're an activist, educator, or community leader, this toolkit gives you everything you need to design campaigns that inspire action and drive real change. Here you will find all practical resources, step-by-step guides, and expert strategies to help you create safer, stronger, and more impactful community campaigns.

Identifying the objectives and goals of an online campaign is the first step in developing a successful and impactful intervention. Setting realistic, achievable, and clear objectives helps ensure that a campaign remains effective and measurable, throughout its entire unfolding.

Defining your message is closely tied to identifying your objectives and goals. Depending on your targeted audience and your final goals, you will need to assess the best way in which to tailor and deliver your message.

Before launching your campaign, it is essential that you consider the safety risks to those involved in advocacy. It can also be beneficial to consider forming strong partnerships with other organizations working in the same space.

The Campaign Toolkit was updated as part of GIFCT’s Addressing Youth Radicalization and Mobilization Working Group in 2025. As such, we have built out a number of resources focusing specifically on campaigns focusing on youth, which can be found below.

Power Your Campaigns with the Right Tools

Power Your Campaigns with the
Right Tools