April 08, 2020  As more of the world rightfully takes social distancing measures to slow the spread of COVID-19, the audience for the Zoom video conferencing app has expanded tremendously. As with all sudden rapid growth of digital social spaces, this expansion has revealed new platform vulnerabilities and opportunities for bad actors to take advantage of those vulnerabilities. ADL has been tracking the prevalence of “Zoombombing” over the last several weeks -- where bad…

April 08, 2020 By now the term “zoombombing,” describing the phenomenon of virtual meetings being disrupted by graphic or hateful messages, has become increasingly familiar. With “safer-at-home” and physical distancing measures to stop the spread of COVID-19, many business and community meetings must rely on video-conferencing tools like Zoom to engage in organizing, educational activities, and worship. Disturbingly, some of these meetings are being disrupted by…

April 03, 2020 As our online lives have become even more central to the way we work, communicate and socialize in this unprecedented time, Washington state has shown tremendous leadership in enacting legislation protecting targets and victims of online hate and harassment, which can have serious and potentially fatal consequences. This significant anti-swatting law, signed by Gov. Jay Inslee today, holds accountable individuals who seek to weaponize law enforcement to attack others. …

April 03, 2020 THE WEEK’S BIG 3 Internet trolls, including some white supremacists, are increasingly taking part in “Zoombombing” – hijacking meetings on the popular video communication app and posting inappropriate content, as well as white supremacist and antisemitic messages. An office for Democratic presidential candidate Bernie Sanders in Florida was vandalized over the weekend with swastikas. Antisemitic pastor and broadcaster Rick Wiles said that the COVID-19…

March 30, 2020 As the coronavirus pandemic has led to more people spending time at home and conducting school and business online, an increasing focus has been placed on certain technologies and their ability to facilitate hate and harassment. Reports of “Zoombombing,” a reference to the popular video conferencing platform Zoom in which virtual meetings are disrupted by graphic or threatening messages or actions, often including those that contain hate speech or pornographic…

February 26, 2020 On February 26, 2020, authorities arrested five members of Atomwaffen Division, including former Texas state Atomwaffen leader John Cameron Denton. These are just the latest detentions targeting the neo-Nazi group, whose active membership has been decimated in the last two years by a steady stream of federal charges and arrests. Denton is charged with conspiracy to commit an offense against the United States, and interstate threats to injure, stemming from his alleged role…

January 16, 2020 In recent years, deadly white supremacist violence at houses of worship in Pittsburgh, Christchurch, and Poway demonstrated the clear line from violent hate speech and radicalization online to in-person violence. With perpetrators of horrific violence taking inspiration from online forums, leveraging the anonymity and connectivity of the internet, and developing sophisticated strategies to spread their messages, the stakes couldn’t be higher in tackling online extremism…

January 09, 2020 THE WEEK’S BIG 3 An estimated 25,000 people marched across the Brooklyn Bridge and then gathered for a community rally, co-sponsored by ADL, in a show of strength and solidarity in response to the recent spate of anti-Semitic violence in the New York City metro area. The U.S. attack that killed an Iranian military leader has spawned a range of anti-Semitic conspiracy theories about Jews “pushing” war against Iran. Music-streaming service Spotify is under…

December 02, 2019 Telegram, the online social networking app, may not be a household name in the U.S. like Twitter or Facebook, but with well over 200 million users, it has a significant audience. And it is gaining popularity. Telegram has become a very popular online gathering place for the international white supremacist community and other extremist groups who have been displaced or banned from more popular sites. The platform, which is a cloud-based chat and group messaging app,…

November 25, 2019 In his remarkable address at ADL’s Never is Now Summit last week, the comedian and actor Sacha Baron Cohen called out major social media platforms, including Facebook and Twitter, for failing to stop the spread of anti-Semitism and hate on their platforms. “All this hate and violence is being facilitated by a handful of internet companies that amount to the greatest propaganda machine in history,” Baron Cohen said in his remarks,…

September 19, 2019 THE WEEK’S BIG 3 ADL sent two of its most senior leaders to Capitol Hill this week to testify in front of Congress about the global threat of white supremacy and the proliferation of hate online. Police in Arapahoe County, Colorado are investigating a Snapchat image picturing three high school students with a caption using explicitly violent, anti-Semitic language. And after an outcry from ADL, the Women’s March voted to remove a board member with a long…

September 09, 2019 New anti-Semitic trolling efforts have emerged on several online platforms in recent weeks, with users weaponizing lists of Jews by variously posting their images, personal information such as names, places of employment, and schools they attend, as well as links to the targets’ social media accounts. Lists of Jews in any form on white supremacist platforms is alarming, especially given the ongoing threats of anti-Semitic violence and targeting of synagogues and…