I
119THCONGRESS
1
STSESSION H. R. 1212
To require the Secretary of Homeland Security to conduct annual assessments
on terrorism threats to the United States posed by terrorist organizations
utilizing foreign cloud-based mobile or desktop messaging applications,
and for other purposes.
IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
FEBRUARY11, 2025
Mr. P
FLUGER(for himself, Mr. PANETTA, Mr. WEBERof Texas, and Mr.
E
VANSof Colorado) introduced the following bill; which was referred to
the Committee on Homeland Security
A BILL
To require the Secretary of Homeland Security to conduct
annual assessments on terrorism threats to the United
States posed by terrorist organizations utilizing foreign
cloud-based mobile or desktop messaging applications,
and for other purposes.
Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representa-1
tives of the United States of America in Congress assembled, 2
SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE. 3
This Act may be cited as the ‘‘Countering Online 4
Radicalization and Terrorism Act’’. 5
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SEC. 2. SENSE OF CONGRESS REGARDING THE USE OF FOR-1
EIGN CLOUD-BASED MOBILE AND DESKTOP 2
MESSAGING APPLICATIONS FOR TERRORIST 3
ACTIVITY. 4
It is the sense of Congress that— 5
(1) the heightened terrorism threat landscape 6
and the increasing utilization of foreign cloud-based 7
mobile and desktop messaging applications by ter-8
rorist organizations represent a national security 9
threat, and the challenges posed by such threat are 10
not well understood; and 11
(2) the Department of Homeland Security, in 12
consultation with the Office of the Director of Na-13
tional Intelligence, must take steps to recognize, as-14
sess, and address such threat, thereby reducing risks 15
to the people of the United States. 16
SEC. 3. ANNUAL ASSESSMENTS ON TERRORISM THREATS 17
TO THE UNITED STATES POSED BY TER-18
RORIST ORGANIZATIONS UTILIZING FOREIGN 19
CLOUD-BASED MOBILE AND DESKTOP MES-20
SAGING APPLICATIONS. 21
(a) A
SSESSMENTS.— 22
(1) I
N GENERAL.—Not later than 180 days 23
after the date of the enactment of this Act and an-24
nually thereafter for five years, the Secretary of 25
Homeland Security, in consultation with the Direc-26
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tor of National Intelligence, shall submit to the ap-1
propriate congressional committees an assessment of 2
terrorism threats to the United States posed by ter-3
rorist organizations utilizing foreign cloud-based mo-4
bile or desktop messaging applications. 5
(2) C
ONTENTS.—The terrorism threat assess-6
ments under paragraph (1) shall address the fol-7
lowing: 8
(A) In the first such assessment, an anal-9
ysis of incidents in which terrorist organizations 10
have utilized foreign cloud-based mobile and 11
desktop messaging applications to facilitate the 12
ability to radicalize and recruit individuals. 13
(B) Information related to online payment 14
features of foreign cloud-based mobile and desk-15
top messaging applications, and how such fea-16
tures provide monetary support to terrorist or-17
ganizations. 18
(C) Recommendations on appropriate 19
measures to address terrorism threats to the 20
United States posed by terrorist organizations 21
utilizing foreign cloud-based mobile or desktop 22
messaging applications. 23
(3) C
OORDINATION.—Each terrorism threat as-24
sessment under paragraph (1)— 25
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(A) shall be coordinated with the Office of 1
the General Counsel, the Privacy Office, and 2
the Office of for Civil Rights and Civil Liberties 3
of the Department of Homeland Security prior 4
to release outside the Department to ensure 5
each such assessment complies with applicable 6
law and protects individuals’ privacy, civil 7
rights, and civil liberties, and 8
(B) may be informed by existing products, 9
as appropriate. 10
(4) F
ORM.—Each terrorism threat assessment 11
under paragraph (1) shall be submitted in unclassi-12
fied form, but may include a classified annex only 13
for the protection of intelligence sources and meth-14
ods relating to the matters contained in such assess-15
ment. The Secretary of Homeland Security shall 16
post on a publicly available website of the Depart-17
ment of Homeland Security the unclassified portion 18
of each such assessment. 19
(5) B
RIEFING.—Not later than 30 days after 20
the submission of each terrorism threat assessment 21
under paragraph (1), the Secretary of Homeland Se-22
curity shall brief the appropriate congressional com-23
mittees regarding each such assessment. The head 24
of any other relevant Federal department or agency 25
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shall join the Secretary for any such briefing if any 1
such committee, in consultation with the Secretary, 2
determines such is appropriate. 3
(6) A
PPROPRIATE CONGRESSIONAL COMMIT -4
TEES.—In this subsection, the term ‘‘appropriate 5
congressional committees’’ means the Committee on 6
Homeland Security and the Permanent Select Com-7
mittee on Intelligence of the House of Representa-8
tives and the Committee on Homeland Security and 9
Governmental Affairs and the Select Committee on 10
Intelligence of the Senate. 11
(b) I
NFORMATION SHARING.—The Secretary of 12
Homeland Security shall review information relating to 13
terrorism threats to the United States posed by terrorist 14
organizations utilizing foreign cloud-based mobile or desk-15
top messaging applications that is gathered by State and 16
local fusion centers and the National Network of Fusion 17
Centers, and incorporate such information, as appropriate, 18
into the Department of Homeland Security’s own informa-19
tion relating to such. The Secretary shall ensure the dis-20
semination to State and local fusion centers and the Na-21
tional Network of Fusion Centers of such information. 22
(c) D
EFINITIONS.—In this section: 23
(1) F
OREIGN CLOUD-BASED MOBILE OR DESK -24
TOP MESSAGING APPLICATIONS .— 25
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(A) IN GENERAL.—The term ‘‘foreign 1
cloud-based mobile or desktop messaging appli-2
cations’’ includes any application specified in 3
subparagraph (B) that has a connection, rela-4
tionship, or other association with or to any of 5
the following: 6
(i) A foreign adversary (as such term 7
is defined in section 7.2 of subpart A of 8
part 7 of subtitle A of title 15, Code of 9
Federal Regulations). 10
(ii) A person owned by, controlled by, 11
or subject to the jurisdiction or direction of 12
a foreign adversary. 13
(iii) A terrorist organization. 14
(B) A
PPLICATIONS SPECIFIED.—An appli-15
cation specified in this subparagraph includes 16
the following: 17
(i) An application owned or operated, 18
in whole or in part, by ByteDance. 19
(ii) Tamtam. 20
(iii) Telegram. 21
(iv) Vkontakte. 22
(v) WeChat. 23
(vi) Weibo. 24
(vii) RedNote. 25
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(viii) Any other application the Sec-1
retary of Homeland Security, in consulta-2
tion with the Director of National Intel-3
ligence, determines appropriate. 4
(2) F
USION CENTER.—The term ‘‘fusion cen-5
ter’’ has the meaning given such term in subsection 6
(k) of section 210A of the Homeland Security Act 7
of 2002 (6 U.S.C. 124h). 8
(3) N
ATIONAL NETWORK OF FUSION CEN -9
TERS.—The term ‘‘National Network of Fusion Cen-10
ters’’ means a decentralized arrangement of fusion 11
centers intended to enhance the ability of individual 12
State and local fusion centers to leverage the capa-13
bilities and expertise of all such fusion centers for 14
the purpose of enhancing analysis and homeland se-15
curity information sharing nationally. 16
(4) T
ERRORIST ORGANIZATION .—The term 17
‘‘terrorist organization’’ means— 18
(A) any entity designated as a foreign ter-19
rorist organization pursuant to section 219 of 20
the Immigration and Nationality Act (8 U.S.C. 21
1189); or 22
(B) any entity engaged in terrorism, as 23
such term is defined in section 2(18) of the 24
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Homeland Security Act of 2002 (6 U.S.C. 1
101(18)). 2
Æ
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