Online Library

In this article we describe our five-year research project on the notorious radical free speech service and fringe platform Gab. During these years we scraped an entire platform, prepared it into a dataset for analysis, and opened it up to a broader community of students and researchers. Each of these projects provides us not just with a small slice of platformized far-right culture but also with a larger sphere of a fringe platform. However, the overarching goal of the Gab project was to contribute to a methodology for the study of the contemporary platformized far right. The atypical nature of the project posed many methodological, epistemological, and legal challenges. It therefore kicked off an institutional learning process about the possibilities, legal boundaries, and best practices for research compliant with General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR). In this article we argue that the study of the platformized far right should have a thorough understanding of the medium on which the object is present, as well as the methods with which the object is captured. What is more, scholars that use digital tools and data methods for capture and analysis of web platforms must become literate in operating them. Consequently, data-driven research on the far right is naturally interdisciplinary and therefore cooperative and adherent to the principles of open science.

An empirical study by the Israel Internet Association analyzes the manner and quality of response by various social media platforms to 447 verified and confirmed reports of harmful content. These reports were submitted to the platforms by the Association’s Internet Safety Hotline, recognized by most platforms as an official Trusted Flagger, after meticulously confirming that all content reported explicitly violated the relevant platforms’ content policies.  The study considers all reports verified and sent to the platforms by the Hotline team between October 7 and December 7, 2023 (the first two months of the Israel-Hamas war) through official channels, the response received from the platforms to these reports, and actions taken or not taken by the platforms in response to the reported content. Parameters evaluated include: response time, the nature and quality of response as a function of content type, and whether the platforms’ actions matched their public commitments to addressing online threats in the wake of the Hamas attacks.

The findings are troubling, and show that response times were exceedingly slow, with little to no action on weekends. Handling of content requiring manual review or contextual understanding was notably poor, revealing significant differences between content types and across different platforms. We show that the same platforms have succeeded in similar situations in other countries, suggesting that success is possible when appropriate resources are channeled into achieving it. We present detailed recommendations as to how to remedy the present situation, and emphasize that responsibility lies not only with the platforms but also with governments and legislators, who permit these companies to operate with minimal transparency and accountability.

VOX-Pol Blog post.

Academic literature widely assumes that extremist-housing online forums, like 4chan, uniformly celebrate acts of right-wing terrorism (e.g. via “sainthood memes”), such as those committed by Anders Breivik and Brenton Tarrant. Aside from a handful of exceptions, this body of research typically fails to acknowledge that ideologically likeminded individuals on 4chan also regularly debate the merits of both terrorists and their violent attacks. Our topic modeling of 100 thousand posts on 4chan’s infamous /pol/ board shows—heated—debates over Breivik and Tarrant ranging from celebratory, to condemning, and moral to conspiratorial. We argue that overlooking these debates limits valuable theoretical and practical insights.

Involuntary celibates (incels) are individuals who feel alienated from society because of their perceived inability to attract women. They share a narrative which valorises violence as a means to restructure society according to misogynistic ideals. Since promoting a radical misogynistic ideology through violence is legally prohibited and socially unacceptable, it is necessary for incels to hide out online where virtual mediums promise anonymity. Virtual relationality (VR) allowed unorganised individuals with a shared grievance against mainstream societal values to develop into a secretive collective. VR means that individuals connect in chatrooms and internet forums where they exchange interpretations of a narrative which presents their social situation as oppressive and dehumanising. They blame ‘modernist’ values and social practices for their ills and share perspectives of how they should interact with the world. These perspectives frequently justify or condone acts of physical violence. Relating in the virtual world gave these individuals’ shared grievances a sense of coherence and allowed for an amplification of the influence of their violent acts by affirming the value of extremist ideas. VR turned individuals without consistent preferences and a unifying organisational medium into a ‘hydra’ with a felt global presence. The virtual nature of incels complicates responses by 1) enabling the collective to have global reach, 2) allowing it to function without an organised body or institutional structures, 3) making it difficult to identify individual incels, and 4) making it difficult to tell when incels pose a genuine security threat. These realities make it crucial to develop a fuller understanding of how the incel collective functions online.

VOX-Pol Blog post.