The cyberwar between Anonymous and Islamic State has just escalated, with the terror group firing back and innocent victims getting caught in the crossfire.

Just as Anonymous took responsibility for removing more than 5,500 Twitter accounts linked to Islamic State, the terrorist organiz

ation has responded with a message of its own.

Posting to a channel for terrorist hackers on encrypted chat app Telegram, Islamic State has claimed to be “owners of the virtual world.”

An initial message written in Arabic and English urged members of IS to unite and update their Twitter profile pictures to show the image of a black shoeprint on the French flag.

This was followed with a secondary message, written only in Arabic, which promised Islamic State would strike back at Anonymous.

Rachel Bryson discovered the message when examining IS propaganda for the Quilliam Foundation — a controversial research institute claiming to challenge Islamic extremism.

“[The message] states that there will be something coming and that we should stay tuned and watch out as [ISIS] declares themselves as the owners of the virtual world,” she described to Business Insider.

“I don’t know if it is literally declaring virtual war on Anonymous, but it is promising a response … They are definitely trying to taunt Anonymous with this.

“Writing a post is easy, it’s doing a strong response that will be the thing to watch for.”

Both messages come as pro-Islamic State Twitter accounts have been taunting Anonymous members, referring to them as “idiots” and giving details on how to avoid being hacked by the activist group.

This comes as the official #OpParis Twitter account used by Anonymous has been sending warnings of fake accounts operating under similar names being operated by Islamic State.

Anonymous claims it has detected attacks to the servers of its website AnonOps — an international communication platform used for reporting the online activity of terrorism.

However, the group admits there was no way to be certain Islamic State was responsible.

Despite the ongoing resistance from Islamic State, Anonymous has continued to push forward with its mission to close down Twitter accounts related to the terrorist organization.

In a fresh salvo, the hacking collective has published a series of guides for members of the public looking to get involved.

The how-to instructions were posted on its IRC channel and encouraged anyone to get involved, regardless of their tech savvy.

“Instead of sitting idle in the [chat] channel or lurking around and doing nothing, you can benefit greatly from the different tools and guides that have been provided to you,” a member of Anonymous wrote on the channel, reports International Business Times.

“Your contribution means a lot and we encourage you to partake in all of the OP’s activities if you can, the more the merrier.”

The release contained information for members wanting to understand hacking; a guide for setting up Twitter bots to uncover IS accounts and details on how to locate IS websites.

“There should be plenty of work to keep you occupied so get going,” the original poster of the guidelines wrote.

“If you wish to submit anything of value, place your findings on ghostbin.com and share to the link to one of the channel operators and we can talk about what to do next.”

Despite the obvious moral dilemma the posting of this information poses, Anonymous believes people will act responsibly with the guidelines, including a request to not use the methods unless explicitly instructed to do so.

While the hacking collective is happy to engage the services of the public in this cyberwar, it has asked people to ensure information they discover is kept private and passed on, so that it can be investigated further.

The message comes amid reports of innocent civilians being wrongly accused of having affiliations with Islamic State.

In the midst of the mayhem, an Anonymous-affiliated user has been forced to post a public apology after incorrectly outing someone he believed to be a member of the terrorist organization.

The public apology was met with an angry response with one Twitter user who claimed he received “a dozen death threats” following his name and address being made public.

An explanation of “false intel” was given in response and the original poster claimed he was incredibly angry at himself for letting it happen. He has promised to do whatever it takes to make things right.

Not everyone is convinced Anonymous’ actions are for the good.

A leading French security blogger claims the hacking collective is doing more harm than it realizes.

Oliver Laurelli said the appeal to get involved might seem enticing, but it would ultimately hinder the efforts of law enforcement and intelligence organizations as it shuts down potential points of investigation for police.

“Young people identify with it and feel they can act but it is counter-productive. It is more embarrassing for the police than anything else,” she told AFP.

“Twitter has been quick to close down a large number of accounts but I don’t know if it’s a good idea.”

Professor Matthew Warren from Deakin University also questioned the effectiveness of the campaign saying it was more politically driven hacktivism than a cyber war.

“The cyber attacks seem to be focused on social media and the removal of ISIS related Twitter accounts, but it’s easy for them to just create new accounts. This means it’s not stopping the problem of radicalization,” he told news.com.

“If you look at some of the accounts that have been flagged some of them have no more than 10 followers, which means they are far from influential.

“You have to wonder if the attacks are going to have any results or if they will just leave Anonymous looking like they are acting on behalf of the Western governments, which will play into IS propaganda.

“If you want to see a proper cyberwar look up the 2007 cyber-attacks where Russian hackers and attackers brought down the complete internet infrastructure in Estonia.”