ISIS really sucks at playing with its cards close to its chest.
Social media is an important avenue for ISIS recruitment and coordination, but its hubris is costing them. Thanks to tweets and Youtube videos from well-known ISIS militants, analysts are able to track exactly where ISIS is headed in its grand strategy.
IHS Conflict Monitor, a data-crunching firm based in Britain, is using the geolocation data from over 4,000 posts written by top ISIS militants to map recent terrorist attacks in the region. The mapped data shows that ISIS has stopped attacking the Kurds in Northern Syria in order to focus on attacking the central Syrian and Iraqi governments.
The U.S. Air Force carried out an airstrike against ISIS after a militant posted a selfie on a public forum. Hopefully, the information gleaned from the IHS data map will allow the military to more effectively curb the ISIS threat.