Solutions and Policy Combat Spreading Hate

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Solutions and Policy Combat Spreading Hate
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Rawlson O’Neil King, theWHIR.com
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May 21, 2004 — (WEB HOST INDUSTRY
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REVIEW) — The Internet has provided hate groups with formerly
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inconceivable opportunities. Online racists, anti-Semites, and
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anti-government extremists can reach a worldwide audience and can more
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easily portray themselves as legitimate. Anyone using the Internet may
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inadvertently be exposed to hate online. When uninformed or easily
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influenced people – particularly children – come across hate
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propaganda, they can fall prey to its deceptive reasoning and adopt
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hateful beliefs themselves, sometimes going so far as to act on what
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they have read.
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Gauging the affects of online hate on the
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vast population of Internet users presents enormous difficulties. No
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reliable measurement has been taken of the number of Internet users who
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find and read hateful material online. Nor can one safely generalize
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about the ways in which this material affects the beliefs and actions
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of those who read it.
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New research however has revealed that
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the amount of hate material on the Web is growing substantially.
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Neo-Nazis, anti-Semites and racists are increasingly using the Internet
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to get their message out, to recruit new members and open new channels
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of communication among sympathizers, according to UK-based email
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filtering company SurfControl (surfcontrol.com).
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The company’s research has found that the number of hate and violence
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Web sites has grown approximately 300 percent since 2000. At that time,
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the firm was tracking 2,756 Web sites. By April 2004 however, the
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number of Internet hate and violence sites under the company’s
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surveillance had risen to 10,926.
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SurfControl also found that number of
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sites that promoted hatred against Jews, Muslims, Americans, Asians,
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homosexuals and blacks, as well as gratuitous violence against these
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groups, had risen by over 25 percent since the beginning of the year.
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During 2003, the number of such sites was
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up by only 30 percent. Susan Larson, SurfControl’s Vice President of
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Global Content, contends that the increase in hate sites has been
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driven by political, social and cultural conflicts, such as the Iraq
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War and proposed legislation to deal with homosexual marriages.
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“Our company has observed the convergence
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of sites promoting violence and those advocating hate,” she states.
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“Many hate sites have been created due to the polarization of religious
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and political public opinion throughout the United States and the
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globe.”
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According to Larson, hate sites are
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problematic due to the liability issues that they can create in the
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workplace environment. Employee exposure to such material can increase
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the risk of litigation against an employer on the basis of harassment
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or discrimination. As a result, network administrators should exercise
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extreme caution, and ensure the implementation of access management
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policies that monitor and filter sites by hate groups.
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SurfControl offers technology that can
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effectively filters out objectionable content, such as hate, based on
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specific criteria. When installed behind a firewall or proxy server,
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SurfControl’s pass-by “sniffer” technology builds an accurate picture
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of network traffic with no impact on network performance. It handles
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all Internet protocols, so that an organization can filter SMTP, POP,
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and NNTP as well as standard HTTP and FTP requests.
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SurfControl can filter offensive traffic
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with minimal network reconfiguration. The firm works to research,
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harvest and categorize objectionable content. Network administrators
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utilizing their technology then have the option to determine what
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content should be screened and barred. Since the filtering system is
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flexible, it can be designed to revolve around specific corporate
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policy. This makes it a powerful tool against hate.
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“We feel that all corporations should
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implement a good, responsible filtering and educate their users on
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proper network usage,” states Larson. “Network usage is always
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evolving, so you need to involve end-users in protecting the network
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and understanding what constitutes proper use.”
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That involves the enforcement of
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acceptable usage policies. Some hosting providers have actively
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demonstrated their commitment to their AUPs. In July 2003, hosting
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reseller Alabanza (alabanza.com)
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removed an anti-Semitic site in accord with its policies, which forbid
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the posting of objectionable material and permitted the removal of such
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a site at its discretion.
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Because hate speech is permissible and
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protected under the First Amendment in the United States, the majority
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of hate sites are situated there. For this reason, technological
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solutions are required in corporate environments to filter them out.
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Service providers are also well advised
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to place restrictions against hate sites in their acceptable usage
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policies. By so doing, they can avoid all the associated legal
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(potential government investigations and lawsuits) and technical issues
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(heavy bandwidth usage and site attacks) associated with hosting them.
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