Terrorism Research & Analysis Consortium

The Terrorism Research & Analysis Consortium (TRAC) is a digital intelligence repository of research and analysis covering terrorism and political violence. It provides editorially reviewed contributions from its consortium members, research associates, and embedded sources to assist decision-makers and researchers from a variety of disciplines. TRAC cross-references incoming, real-time contributions against its entire database of regional and group profiles, spanning every ideology, target, and tactic. The website also offers a clipping service called Chatter Control to bring primary resource material from social media and news from beyond the scope of Western media outlets to its clients' attention.

According to a May 2013 NPR interview, TRAC's founder Veryan Khan partnered with the Beacham Group LLC as "editorial director of tracterrorism.org and an associate publisher," preparing research for nearly a decade before launching the site. Shortly after going live in 2012, TRAC had over 6,000 pages and a "master index and profiles of 3,800 identified terrorist groups and groups known to aid and abet terrorist organizations."

TRAC was officially launched in Fall 2011 by the Beacham Group LLC, an academic and reference publisher founded in 1985. Originally Beacham Publishing Corp., the Beacham Group specializes in comprehensive reference works in subject areas such as endangered species, environmental issues, young adult literature, popular fiction, and European and American biography.

Initial research for the TRAC database began in the late 1990s, as global awareness of terrorism was rising due to activities of groups like FARC, the IRA, and Pakistani groups associated with the Taliban. The PLO profile was the first profile developed and impetus for the articles on terrorism in nationalist and separatist movements. TRAC's coverage of Islamist terrorism expanded as the demand for research on terrorism responded to the 9/11 attacks in New York City.

Initially, consortium members were largely academics drawn from universities around the world. One of the first research partners, Arabinda Acharya, joined in 2009. The scope of professions represented by the consortium's 2,800 initial members widely varied from that point up to the online launch in 2012.

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