SYDNEY: Terror outfits are using social networking giant Facebook to recruit loners from Western nations like Australia to their cause, a leading counter-terrorism expert has claimed. 

Bill Paterson, the Australian Ambassador for Counter Terrorism, said that terrorists have embraced the rise of technology, the internet in particular, to spread their messages and attract followers. 

"Established terrorist cells have found social media to be a useful communication tool - Facebook, Twitter, that sort of thing," News.com.au quoted Paterson, as saying. 

"Facebook can be a recruitment tool (but) Twitter is more for operational communication," he added. 

Paterson stressed that social media has also encouraged the rise of home-grown terrorism, particularly among 'disaffected loners sometimes on the margins of society,' adding that Norwegian mass killer Anders Breivik is a prime example. 

He also pointed out that in democratic countries where internet censorship is seen as an 'infringement of freedom of information' or a breach on civil liberties, stopping terrorists from communicating on social media is difficult. 

"If you're in an authoritarian country you just do it but you can't in a country like Australia," he added.