In your research how prevalent you find this online extremism these ideologies are in gaming. So we've seen everything from like an individual user's username that references the Christchurch New Zealand mass shooter to entire groups of hundreds of individuals referring to 1970s white supremacist terrorist organizations. It really runs the gamut one of the big challenges for me in tracking this is like there are so many different vectors of attack and vectors of misuse on these games it's actually hard to kind of get a handle on. We do not know the actual sort of extent of it the volume of it and the prevalence of it in these games.
In December, an Anti-Defamation League study found a sharp rise in the number of people who say they’ve encountered white supremacist ideology while playing online video games. The persistent presence of individual gamers and groups spreading hate in gaming communities has led to calls for the industry to do more to stop it.
The question is, how?
Bloomberg video game reporter Cecilia D’Anastasio joins this episode to explain why it’s so difficult to police virtual worlds, and what companies are and aren’t doing to confront the problem. Alex Newhouse, deputy director of the Middlebury Institute’s Center on Terrorism, Extremism and Counterterrorism, talks about his work trying to help the gaming industry stamp out toxic culture on its platforms.
For More on Cecilia’s story: https://bloom.bg/3Dx2yzo
Listen to The Big Take podcast every weekday and subscribe to our daily newsletter: https://bloom.bg/3F3EJAK
Have questions or comments for Wes and the team? Reach us at bigtake@bloomberg.net.
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.