In the 2016/2017 during the Final Synthesis Laboratory at "Politecnico di Milano" we were asked to use information visualization both as an analytical and a communicative tool, to observe, understand, shape and communicate complex phenomena. In the first part of the course, we had to find and collect data from official sources relevant to their topic (open data from governments, scientific papers, etc…) so we could get a first grasp of the depth and complexity of these issues. The result is a one-page website with a series of visualizations that represented a general overview of the topic, seen with the eyes of the “official” sources.

The issue we analyzed is the Terrorism. It is a complex phenomenon, but there are three core sources that could be identified as triggers of a plurality of ideologies: political, ethnical and religious. Despite the latter has grown exponentially in recent years, all are part of a dangerous phenomenon that always involves several points of view: besides the groups also the affected places and, especially, the victims. This project examines the phenomenon from all these points of view, trying to answer this question: is all so simple as it seems?