The UK is in the midst of a “lone wolf epidemic”, with the majority of terrorist attacks being conducted by individuals, according to new research. The Institute for Economics and Peace (IEP) found that 93% of fatal attacks over the last five years in the West were carried out by individuals acting alone, whilst the number of attacks carried out in the West doubled in 2024.

Alarmingly, the research shows that nearly half of all terror arrests in the UK last year were conducted by under 18s, more than double the figure seen across Europe. Steve Killelea, Founder and Chairman of IEP told the Express: “The key thing (the research found) is that a lot of them (lone wolf attackers) are youths. Of attacks in the UK, 42% of them are youths under 18 years of age but if we look at Europe, that is just 20% which makes it hard for the authorities to track.”

Nearly two-thirds of ISIS-linked arrests in Europe involved teenagers, with radicalisation occurring online at an alarming rate.

According to the research, the amount of time between first exposure to extremist material and committing a terrorist attack has fallen dramatically in recent years, with youngsters now being radicalised within weeks.

Killelea added: “The time it takes for people to radicalise is decreasing and that creates all sorts of issues for intelligence services.

“In 2002, it was generally about 16 months, by 2015 it had dropped to around six months and sometimes today, people can be radicalised within weeks.

“But lone actors are three times more likely to be successful when they launch an attack than a group, simply because of the minimum footprint that they leave behind which makes it hard for the intelligence services to track, particularly if they are self-radicalised in a short space of time.”

The research has led to believe there is an “epidemic” within the UK, with the evolution of technology and social media believed to be largely to blame for increased levels of radicalisation.

A former Army Intelligence captain who now works in the private sector and wishes to remain anonymous said: “Lone wolf attacks are nothing new, we have seen them throughout history in varying forms. But what is new is the way in which young people are able to be reached by extreme material and propaganda, making it really hard for them to be identified, monitored or disrupted.

“The prevalence of these forms of attacks rather than small cells orchestrated by large groups has been striking in recent years. It feels like we are facing an epidemic of lone wolf attacks across the country and Europe more generally.”

In 2021, the then Metropolitan Police Commissioner warned of a “new wave” of extremism emerging amongst young children following an increase in the number of under 18s being arrested for terror offences.

Cecilia Polizzi, CEO of The International Center for Children and Global Security believes that a trend away from ideological motivations is making youth radicalisation harder to categorise.

She said: “A mix of political grievances, conspiracy theories, and overlapping ideologies has given rise to bespoke belief systems used to justify violence.

“Organisations like the Islamic State and al-Qaeda, once defining actors in the ecosystem of global extremism, no longer represent the predominant threats facing Western societies.

“Ideological fluidity blurs the boundaries between belief systems, posing significant challenges to the effectiveness of prevention and intervention strategies.”

Prime Minister Keir Starmer announced a public inquiry would be held into the failure of authorities to prevent 17-year-old Axel Rudakubana from carrying out his horrifying knife attack in Southport, which left three young girls dead.

Rudakubana had been referred to the government’s Prevent programme three times prior to the killings but was not deemed dangerous enough to warrant further action.

In January, he was jailed for life, to serve a minimum of 52 years for the murder of the three girls in July 2024, the attempted murder of 10 others (eight children and two adults) and for possession of a knife in a public place, production of a biological toxin namely ricin contrary to Section 1 of the Biological Weapons Act 1974 and possession of information, namely a PdF file entitled ‘Military Studies in the Jihad Against the Tyrants: The Al-Qaeda Training Manual, of a kind likely to be useful to a person committing, or preparing, an act of terrorism, contrary to Section 58 of the Terrorism Act 2000.

Speaking following his sentencing, Starmer said: “We also see acts of extreme violence perpetrated by loners, misfits, young men in their bedroom, accessing all manner of material online.

“If the law needs to change to recognise this new and dangerous threat, then we will change it and quickly.”

A Home Office spokesperson said: “The UK’s threat picture is complex, evolving and enduring, which is why we have one of the strongest counter-terrorism frameworks in the world. This includes a wide range of specialist counter-terrorism powers to detect, investigate and disrupt terrorist activity.

“The independent inquiry into the events of Southport will be looking at the wider challenge of rising youth violence and extremism to ensure no one falls through the cracks. We continue to work at pace to identify the nature and scale of a growing cohort fixated with violence and to improve multi-agency interventions to manage the risk they pose.”