Global Terrorism Database 1.1: Terrorist Events Worldwide, 1970-1997

61,637 terrorist events worldwide were recorded by the Pinkerton Global Intelligence Service between 1970 and 1997. The Global Terrorism Database 1.1 (GTD1.1) was developed by researchers at the University of Maryland, who supplemented the original PGIS data with incidents from other sources. Variables include group name, incident type, date, location, target details, weapons used, casualties, and outcomes like success or ransom.

Use Cases

• Analyzing temporal and geographic trends of terrorism based on incident dates and country/region variables.
• Profiling terrorist group tactics and target selection based on group name, weapon type, and target identity variables.
• Modeling the human cost of terrorist incidents based on variables for total number killed and wounded.
• Studying the outcomes of kidnapping and hostage events based on variables for ransom demanded and paid.

Strengths

• Contains 61,637 events, providing a substantial historical record.
• Covers a 28-year time range (1970-1997) for longitudinal analysis.
• Uses a broad definition of terrorism, potentially capturing a wide range of incidents.
• Data underwent a verification process and was supplemented from multiple sources.

Limitations

• Column-level documentation is absent; field semantics must be inferred after download.
• Last update date is unknown; freshness unverified.
• Data may reflect geographic or source bias inherent to the original PGIS collection methodology.

Provenance

Source

Pinkerton Global Intelligence Service (PGIS), supplemented by University of Maryland researchers.

Collection Method

Originally collected by PGIS, then digitized and verified via a web-based data entry system by researchers.

Time Range

1970 through 1997

Geography

Worldwide