Web Trafficking: Analysing the Online Trade of Small Arms and Light Weapons in Libya

by N.R. Jenzen-Jones, Ian McCollum

This Working Paper from the Small Arms Survey’s Security Assessment in North Africa (SANA) project provides an in-depth analysis of the trade in small arms and light weapons in the online marketplace. The Working Paper ties together interviews with marketplace participants with a detailed analysis of a dataset derived from long-term monitoring of some of the closed social media-based groups listing small arms and light weapons for sale. It explores the types of weapons offered and their likely routes into the Libyan online markets. It concludes with a policy-relevant analysis of the current state of Libya’s online markets and discusses the caveats and utility of such online monitoring for supplementing field-based research.

‘Web Trafficking’ also includes a lengthy annexe providing information and analysis about some of the more noteworthy weapons offered for sale on the online platforms. The annexe focuses on the more recently manufactured weapons. In its second section, it looks at some of the older, legacy weapons still circulating in the country. The Annexe offers a window in the types of weapons in circulation in Libya and the larger region that will be interesting to policy makers, experts, and others interested in the illicit proliferation of weapons in North Africa.

112 pages, Paperback

Published April 1, 2017

About the author

N.R. Jenzen-Jones is a technical intelligence specialist, arms historian, and publisher. He is the Editor of Armax: The Journal of Contemporary Arms, the director of Armament Research Services (ARES), and the founder of Helios House Press—publishers of the Miskatonic Missives series of Lovecraftian epistolary readers and the Miskatonic Literary Society series of gothic horror tales. He is the creative director for Miskatonic Missives and the editor of the Christmas with H.P. Lovecraft anthology. Dr Jenzen-Jones holds a visiting fellowship at Nottingham Trent University. He previously held visiting fellowships at Staffordshire University and the University of Northampton, and was awarded the Buffalo Bill Center of the West’s 2022–2023 Resident Fellowship for his work with the Cody Firearms Museum.

In his professional life, Dr Jenzen-Jones maintains a broad focus on how weapons are selected, acquired, stockpiled, and employed. He is a Liveryman of the Worshipful Company of Gunmakers, a fellow of the Royal Asiatic Society, a life member of the Ordnance Society and the H.P. Lovecraft Historical Society, and a member of the Historical Breechloading Smallarms Association (HBSA), the Arms & Armour Society, the International Ammunition Association (IAA), the European Cartridge Research Association (ECRA), the British Institute for Libyan & Northern African Studies (BILNAS), and the Pike & Shot Society.