Buffalo Shooting Prompts NJ Investigation Into Twitch, Discord

NEW JERSEY — Two social-media platforms linked to the Buffalo mass shooting may violate New Jersey law, according to state authorities. The New Jersey Office of the Attorney General launched an investigation into whether Twitch and Discord break state consumer-protection laws by failing to both moderate harmful content and enforce policies prohibiting violent extremism.

The suspect of the May 14 attack used the platforms to plan and publicize the mass shooting before killing 10 Black people at a grocery store in a predominantly Black neighborhood, authorities said. Payton S. Gendron, a white man, livestreamed the shooting on Twitch. He previously detailed the shooting plan on Discord.

Authorities have called the shootings a racist hate crime and an act of terrorism.

The shootings shed light on Twitch and Discord, which already received criticism from users alleging failures to take action against people spreading racism and hate on the platforms. The AG's office is investigating whether lax content moderation and policy enforcement allow the platforms to serve as an entry point for children to come in contact with extremist ideologies.

"These social media platforms have enormous reach, especially with young people, and have shown themselves to be staging grounds for hateful and extremist content that may radicalize children and others," said Acting Attorney General Matthew J. Platkin. "New Jersey has a substantial interest in investigating how these companies moderate and prohibit content that may harm consumers. Under New Jersey law companies must deliver on their promises, and the persistence of violent extremism and hateful conduct on these platforms casts doubt on their purported content moderation and enforcement policies and practices."

About Twitch And Discord

Twitch — an Amazon-owned streaming service that's popular with gamers — has received criticism for reports of frequent "hate raids." The raids refer to when a streamer's channel gets flooded with slurs, threats and abusive language.

Marginalized streamers have accused Twitch of not doing enough to prevent hate raids. Twitch publicly acknowledged the issue in August, tweeting that the platform rolled out an update to "better detect hate speech in chat."

Twitch later included new account-verification options and sued two users who they believe are among the worst offenders. But the platform has come under fire for the continued prevalence of hate raids and allegations of inconsistent policies.

In December 2020, Twitch came under fire for banning the term "simp," "incel" and "virgin" but leaving use of the N-word unaddressed publicly. Days later, Twitch addressed its policies on using the N-word on its website: use with a "hard R" would prompt an automatic block. The platform also said it prohibited "slurs used for the purpose of hate or harassment."

Discord — an instant-messaging platform with communities called "servers" — gained popularity with white supremacists, according to the Southern Poverty Law Center. White nationalists used the platform to plan the 2017 "Unite the Right" rally in Charlottesville, Virginia, which resulted in riots.

Following the riots, Discord executives condemned "white supremacy" and "neo-Nazism." Discord closed the servers that they believe incited the Charlottesville riots and worked with the Southern Poverty Law Center to identify and ban hateful groups.

But Discord has had issues since with white nationalists.In 2019, leaked chat logs revealed a Discord server used by white-nationalist group Identity Evropa. Users included seven U.S. military members, according to HuffPost.

The Buffalo-shooting suspect used a private Discord server as a diary for weeks as he prepared the attacks. Gendron invited several users to the server about 30 minutes before the shooting, and the messages were later published on 4chan. The server was deleted shortly after the shooting, Discord says.