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Trump on ISIS: 'We've got to take back the internet'

Trump on ISIS: 'We've got to take back the internet'

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Following the attacks on Paris, Donald Trump this week suggested the United States would have to "take back the internet" from ISIS, which he says has been effectively using the web as a recruitment tool.

"They're literally brainwashing people."

"They're using the internet, and they're recruiting people," Trump said on a trip to Massachusetts, according to The Washington Post. "We've got to take back the internet because they are taking people. They're literally brainwashing people. They're brainwashing our youth... We can't let that happen. We have innocent youth, and they are misguided."

Trump — although not unveiling any specific plan — isn't far off from what US officials are already saying about ISIS. To fight the group's online propaganda machine, officials have reportedly been attempting to counter ISIS's messaging through its own social media campaign, albeit with limited success. More than 350 State Department Twitter accounts, as well as other accounts, have been coordinating to turn the tide of propaganda, as officials post messages around the web.

But Trump, in another interview this week given to New Hampshire Today and spotted by BuzzFeed, suggested the US wasn't doing enough to stop ISIS. "They’re using the internet better than we use the internet," he said. "And we just don’t have a clue. I mean, our people don’t have a clue."

Trump, although effective at employing social media, is not always the savviest tech user: he reportedly doesn't have a laptop in his office, and gets his emails printed.