Read this first
Two of the three entries are not cells. The Luddites were a movement without a proven central organisation, and Kaczynski acted alone for seventeen years. Only ITS presented itself as a group. More importantly, the category the popular account assumes exists does not appear in the documents.
- The Homeland Threat Assessment editions for 2020, 2024 and 2025 contain no section on environmental or animal rights violent extremism. Their technology passages concern artificial intelligence, cyber intrusion, drones and supply chains.
- No FBI or DHS document on this page uses anti-technology as a threat category, a motive or a label.
- No federal document on this page names ITS, and none mentions the Luddites.
The Luddites
Machine breaking was answered with statute. The Frame-Breaking Act of 1812 made the destruction of stocking frames a capital offence, and the Commons debated the bill on 17 February 1812. Home Office papers and the surviving proclamation signed in the name of Ned Ludd are the primary record.
- 1812: 52 George 3 c.16, The Frame-Breaking Act, The Statutes Project
- Frame Work Bill, House of Commons debate, 17 February 1812, UK Parliament, Historic Hansard
- The proclamation of Ned Ludd, The National Archives (UK)
Theodore Kaczynski, the Unabomber
A lone actor, not a cell. His manifesto, Industrial Society and Its Future, was published on 19 September 1995 after he offered to stop the bombings in exchange for print. He pleaded guilty in January 1998.
Over the next 17 years, he mailed or hand delivered a series of increasingly sophisticated bombs that killed three Americans and injured nearly two dozen more.
Limitation. A case history written by the investigating agency, not a threat assessment. It carries the casualty tally and the timeline, and nothing about a category of anti-technology extremism.
Justice has been done, and Theodore Kaczyncski will never threaten anyone again.
Limitation. The statement is on the plea agreement. The misspelling of the surname is in the original release. No Justice Department release on the May 1998 sentencing could be located.
- Industrial Society and Its Future, Washington Post version, The Ted K Archive
Individualidades tendiendo a lo Salvaje (ITS)
The group announced itself through published communiques declaring war on nanotechnology, and cited Kaczynski's argument directly. What is known publicly comes largely from those communiques and the reporting on them.
The category the FBI and DHS do define
There is no anti-technology heading in the federal taxonomy. The nearest category is animal rights and environmental violent extremism, defined by grievance against cruelty to animals and destruction of natural resources. Here is the definition and how it has been restated across three joint reports to Congress.
As defined by the FBI and DHS, animal rights/environmental violent extremism encompasses the potentially unlawful use or threat of force or violence in furtherance of ideological agendas by those seeking to end or mitigate perceived cruelty, harm, or exploitation of animals and/or the perceived exploitation or destruction of natural resources and the environment.
Limitation. This is the joint report to Congress, not a public threat bulletin. The category is defined by grievance against animal cruelty and environmental destruction. It does not name technology as a motive.
(3) Animal Rights/Environmental Violent Extremism: This threat category encompasses the potentially unlawful use or threat of force or violence, in violation of federal law, in furtherance of political and/or social agendas by those seeking to end or mitigate perceived cruelty, harm, or exploitation of animals and/or the perceived exploitation or destruction of natural resources and the environment.
We assess that violent extremists supporting animal rights and environmental causes will continue to disrupt the operation of critical infrastructure to try to exact an economic toll on the industries they target.
Limitation. The forward-looking line is an assessment, which is a judgement rather than a finding. The report states the standard of confidence it is made under.
The FBI and DHS I&A assess environmental violent extremists (EVEs) in FY 2022 continued to commit criminal actions intended to cause financial loss or operational damage and disruption against entities perceived to be exploiting or contributing to destruction of the environment or natural resources.
Animal rights violent extremists (ARVEs) continued to target entities perceived to be harming or exploiting animals through crimes such as vandalism, trespassing, and threats of violence.
Limitation. Covers fiscal year 2022 only. The conduct described is property crime and threats, not the bombing campaigns the popular account of anti-tech violence is built on.
How the FBI defined eco-terrorism to Congress
The FBI defines eco-terrorism as the use or threatened use of violence of a criminal nature against innocent victims or property by an environmentally-oriented, subnational group for environmental-political reasons, or aimed at an audience beyond the target, often of a symbolic nature.
Some special interest extremists -- most notably within the animal rights and environmental movements -- have turned increasingly toward vandalism and terrorist activity in attempts to further their causes.
Limitation. Testimony from 2002 and the FBI's own framing of its caseload at the time. The live fbi.gov page no longer serves the text, so the link points at the FBI's own archive copy. The word technology does not appear in it.
Read the essay
The longer argument, including the timeline from 1811 to 2020, is in Why does anti-tech extremism keep coming back?