Tech & Terrorism: Internet
Infrastructure Companies Critical To Curbing Online
Extremism
Role Is Critical As Online Hate
Has Translated To Real-World Violence
(New York, N.Y.) - Extremists across the world
have misused social media platforms to upload violent propaganda and
hateful manifestos. Counter Extremism Project (CEP) Executive Director
David Ibsen recently wrote in an op-ed for The
Hill about the attacks in El Paso, Christchurch, and
Poway—all of which have links to 8chan’s politically incorrect board,
an online message board known for attracting far-right and neo-Nazi
users due to its lax content moderation policies. Ibsen states that
despite 8chan’s refusal to remove white nationalist and white
supremacist material under the guise of protecting free speech,
Internet infrastructure companies “have demonstrated that it is
possible to combat such inaction and prevent the spread of extremist
content.”
Internet infrastructure companies such as Voxility can choose to
cease providing services to other tech firms that support and help
facilitate the spread of extremism online, thereby shutting down those
companies’ operations, as Voxility did in the case of the El Paso
attack and Epik/Bitmitigate. He explains, “Voxility’s decision serves
as a useful example of how a business-to-business (B2B) tech company
can help prevent the spread of hateful, extremist content by denying
critical services to other firms … The Internet is effectively a
network of networks, an ecosystem where a reliance on others can be
leveraged to mitigate the most extreme and dangerous websites.”
Neo-Nazi groups and other extremists
have also used Internet and social media sites to urge real-world
violence and recruit supporters. Recently, the Feuerkrieg Division
(FKD) claimed
prior knowledge about a planned attack on Las Vegas Jewish
and LGBTQ communities. CEP has written previously on FKD’s propensity
to call for real-life violence and praise
for white supremacists Dylann Roof and Robert Bowers.
A recent VICE
News article pointed to the rise of recruitment and
presence of “The Base” across major North American cities. Social
media platforms have been utilized by “The Base,” a connected group to
the Atomwaffen Division and FKD, to recruit members and participation
in weapons and live-fire training. CEP researcher Joshua Fisher-Birch
stated that “The Base presents a ‘significant threat’ because it is
attempting to build a network with ‘individuals in different groups,
or those with slight ideological differences … the group has ‘combined
online recruitment efforts with real-world efforts’ including
supporting ‘lone-actor violence’ and ‘shared terrorist tactics.’”
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