How Polaris is fighting QAnon

How Polaris is fighting QAnon

How Polaris is fighting QAnon

When tech entrepreneur Anjana Rajan joined Polaris as its Chief Technology Officer last year, she thought she was setting aside her prior focus on domestic terrorism to help Polaris with its core mission of fighting human trafficking.

But then Rajan learned the far-right conspiracy group QAnon had been making outlandish human trafficking allegations against Polaris resulting in massive Denial of Service or DDoS attacks by QAnon followers who were even making death threats against the non-profit.

Suddenly, Rajan found that her world had come full circle. Over the past year, she’s had to bring all of her national security and technology skills to bear to expand Polaris’s mission to investigate this nexus of human trafficking and domestic terrorism.

Anjana Rajan’s work and that of her Polaris team resulted in a recent report called  — Countering QAnon: Understanding the Role of Human Trafficking in the Disinformation-Extremist Nexus. Rajan shares the key findings from that report and what it means for U.S. domestic security.

This is another fascinating episode in our yearlong exploration of conspiracy theories, radicalization, and domestic terrorism in the wake of the January 6th attacks on the U.S. Capitol by armed, violent supporters of former President Donald Trump.

Read more and listen here.