This article examines whether a terrorist group's ideology has a meaningful impact on its involvement in kidnapping. On a global level, incident data (1970-2010) indicate that in the past decade the number of kidnappings by terrorist groups has increased, while Muslim extremists have replaced left-wing/Marxist revolutionaries as the world's leading kidnappers. However, when we incorporate data about the attributes of terrorist organizations and their operating environments, this analysis indicates that ideology does not play an important role in determining the likelihood of a group's involvement in kidnapping. The article concludes with implications and suggested topics for further study. © The Author(s) 2012.