January 12, 2026: Boko Haram, a Nigeria based Islamic terrorist group, has embraced digital technology for their operations using encrypted apps like Telegram and WhatsApp to communicate. This goes beyond carrying out new attacks. These apps also allow Boko Haram to not only communicate securely but to also recruit new members, plan attacks and coordinate operations in general. One important operation is to spread disinformation on apps or social media sites that a lot of Nigerians frequent. Most of the messages go out in Hausa, the language of the Moslem north. Most Nigerians understand a local dialect of English and standard English is the official language for government, education, and business. Boko Haram exploits this widespread use of English to share their propaganda with more than a billion English speakers worldwide. Although Boko Haram literally means Western Education is Forbidden, this Islamic terrorist group educates themselves, or recruits members who are well educated, to help with communications and propaganda.

Unencrypted apps like TikTok, along with propaganda videos in Social Media sites can enrage Muslims who will then attack their Christian attackers. Boko Haram regularly spreads false accusations to Christians abusing Moslems and before the accusations can be proven false, a lot of mayhem, deaths, injuries and tarnished reputations can occur. Given the nearly universal adoption of cellphones in Nigeria, this Boko Haram propaganda and other messages find a large audience and an endless supply of new recruits or supporters.

The oil-rich west coast African nation of Nigeria continues to have problems with Islamic terrorist groups Boko Haram and especially the local Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant/ISIL faction known as Islamic State West Africa Province/ISWAP. The latest disaster was a May 4, 2025, ISWAP attack on an army supercamp in northeastern Yobe State. This attack featured the ISWAP use of motorbikes instead of 4x4 vehicles. Yobe State terrain is flat with little cover. ISWAP found motorbikes more effective than larger vehicles. The attack on the supercamp left four soldiers dead and many more wounded. ISWAP gunmen vandalized part of the camp for several hours. They got away with weapons, ammunition and other supplies.

ISWAP has stuck with its strategy of concentrating on the security forces, and doing so by assembling a large enough number of gunmen to ensure, most of the time, a quick victory. The continued prevalence of corruption and incompetent officers in the army has contributed to continued chaos and lawlessness in northern Borno State, where most of the population was displaced by Boko Haram violence in 2014-15 and when Boko Haram control was broken by 2017. After that government programs to revive the economy and restore law and order collapsed under the usual corruption and incompetence of local officials and security forces. Even a reform-minded president who was a former general and Moslem was unable to push military reforms far enough and fast enough. Boko Haram is not winning; but the government is failing to finish off a defeated Boko Haram and take advantage of an opportunity to regain the trust and loyalty of the local population. ISIL took advantage of similar conditions to quickly overrun more than a third of Iraq in 2014. Many Nigerian leaders are well aware of how that worked but the corruption is so entrenched and widespread that reform moves slowly and that left the army and government officials vulnerable to a well-organized Boko Haram comeback.

ISWAP is also known as the Barnawi or AL Barnawi faction of Boko Haram. ISWAP has apparently received a lot of useful technical and tactical advice from ISIL veterans of fighting in Iraq, Syria and Libya. Boko Haram persists in the northeast in large part because of its willingness to experiment, innovate and take advice from foreign ISIL veterans. The Barnawi faction follows the current ISIL doctrine of concentrating attacks on security forces and government officials, preferably the corrupt ones. That makes it easier to extort more cash and other goods from the local population.

In 2019 the Barnawi faction had over 3,000 active gunmen and operated mainly in the far north of Borno state near Lake Chad and the borders of Niger and Chad. The smaller Shekau faction has about half as many armed men and operates further south near the Borno State capital of Maiduguri and the Sambisa Forest. Both factions rely on the fact that the years of Boko Haram violence in Borno State, where Boko Haram originated in 2004, has increased the poverty and corruption the Islamic terrorist organization was founded to eliminate. Many potential recruits are discouraged by stricter standards and a more fanatic approach by Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant. Compared to the original Boko Haram, the most hard core Islamic radicals are drawn to the more extreme groups and that way Boko Haram persists.

Current ISWAP strength is closer to 4,000 fighters. Boko Haram is still around, with fewer gunmen than ISWAP. Both of these Islamic terrorist organizations have been fighting each other since 2021. The army has taken advantage of this, but corruption and frequent incompetence have enabled the Islamic terrorist groups to continue surviving. The government has tried to exploit the Islamic terrorists’ civil war.

Back in 2020 some army commanders in the northeastern Borno State tried to blame foreign Non-Government Organizations/NGOs for providing a steady flow of reports, documented with pictures and videos showing army misbehavior and mistreatment of civilians. The foreigners were also accused of spying for Boko Haram and deliberately spreading false reports of army misbehavior to hurt the morale of troops and loyalty of local civilians. These accusations tended to be quickly withdrawn when senior officers back in the national capital heard of it. The generals in the high command knew the NGO reports were true because these reports were often quietly double-checked by high command investigators. Such retractions were just another reminder of the problems the military faced and were unable to fix, in the northeast.