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This article examines the complexities of regulating hate speech on the Internet through legal frameworks. It demonstrates the limitations of unilateral national content legislation and the difficulties inherent in multilateral efforts to regulate the Internet. The article highlights how the US commitment to free speech has undermined European efforts to construct a truly international regulatory system. It is argued that a broad coalition of citizens, industry and government, employing technological, educational and legal frameworks, may offer the most effective approach through which to limit the effects of hate speech originating from outside of European borders.

VOX-Pol Blog post.

VOX-Pol Blog post.

How do right-wing extremist organisations throughout the world use the Internet as a tool for communication and recruitment? What is its role in identity-building within radical right-wing groups and how do they use the Internet to set their agenda, build contacts, spread their ideology and encourage mobilization? This important contribution to the field of Internet politics adopts a social movement perspective to address and examine these important questions. Conducting a comparative content analysis of more than 500 extreme right organizational web sites from France, Germany, Italy, Spain, the United Kingdom and the United States, it offers an overview of the Internet communication activities of these groups and systematically maps and analyses the links and structure of the virtual communities of the extreme right. Based on reports from the daily press the book presents a protest event analysis of right wing groups’ mobilisation and action strategies, relating them to their online practices. In doing so it exposes the new challenges and opportunities the Internet presents to the groups themselves and the societies in which they exist.

What is the EU doing to counter terrorist propaganda online?

The EU Terrorism Situation and Trend Report (TE-SAT) was established in the aftermath of the 11 September 2001 attacks in the United States of America (US), as a reporting mechanism from the Terrorism Working Party (TWP) of the Council of the EU to the European Parliament. The content of the TE-SAT reports is based on information supplied by EU Member States, some third states (Colombia, Croatia, Iceland, Norway, Switzerland, Turkey, and the United States of America) and third organisations (Eurojust and Interpol), as well as information gained from open sources.