Terrorist attacks in 2023, by country

In 2023, Syria was the country with the highest number of terrorist attacks, reaching 1,405. That year, more than  5,300 terrorist attacks were registered worldwide, resulting in almost 16,000 fatalities.

Global trends in terrorism

While the War on Terror and the hunt for Al Qaeda and Osama bin Laden dominated global coverage of terrorism after the 9/11 attacks in 2001, the focus moved to the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria after gaining large territories in the two countries in 2014. Although the group continues to be active, it has lost much of its territory in Iraq and Syria and has moved activities to other countries such as Afghanistan and Western Africa.

Economic costs of terrorism

Next to causing devastating human losses and tragedy, terrorism causes severe economic damage. For instance, the property losses of the 9/11 attacks in the United States had an insured value of more than 27 billion U.S. dollars. Still, terrorism causes the highest economic damage in the countries most impacted by terrorist activity.