Videos on YouTube of a 10- year-old boy executing a captive, and Facebook and Twitter posts praising the brutal methods of the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria (ISIS) militant group in recent months have attracted millions of viewers and made headlines.

It was thus no surprise that with terrorists latching on to social media to woo recruits, several participants at a regional meeting on countering terrorism called for more to be done to curb ISIS’ freedom online and restrict its reach.

But Mr Richard Stengel, United States Under Secretary of State for Public Diplomacy and Public Affairs, told the first panel at the East Asia Summit Symposium on Religious Rehabilitation and Social Reintegration – the only one open to the media – that it was not just the job of governments to shut these views out.

… Symposium convener Rohan Gunaratna said much of extremist activity online takes place on platforms hosted in the US, and asked why the country had yet to clamp down on this. “You must address this challenge, because it is these platforms that are currently polluting the minds of our youth,” he said. “Unless we address this challenge, every day there will be new sympathisers and supporters of terrorist groups.”