The Internet and Racial Hate Crime: Offline Spillovers from Online Access

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The Internet and Racial Hate Crime: Offline Spillovers from Online Access

Abstract

We empirically investigate the effect of the Internet on racial hate crimes in the United States from the period two thousand one to two thousand eight. We find evidence that, on average, broadband availability increases racial hate crimes. We also document that the Internet's impact on these hate crimes is not uniform in that the positive effect is stronger in areas with higher levels of racism, which we identify as those with more segregation and a higher proportion of racially charged search terms, but not significant in areas with lower levels of racism. We analyze in depth whether Internet access will enhance hate group operations but find no support for the idea that this mechanism is driving the result. In contrast, we find that online access is increasing the incidence of racial hate crimes executed by lone wolf perpetrators. We describe several other mechanisms that could be driving the results. Overall, our results shed light on one of the many offline societal challenges from increased online access.

One. Introduction

Widespread Internet penetration is associated with several benefits, but it has also introduced unique societal challenges as documented by other research. One such challenge is online hate content. The Internet provides an accessible, affordable, unscreened, and anonymous channel for posting and sharing hate ideologies. Anecdotally, this has led to an increase in hate-related websites. In two thousand eleven, close to fourteen thousand sites were reported to contain hate-related content, representing a six-fold increase from that in two thousand. In particular, over sixty-five percent of the active hate sites tracked by the anti-bigotry NGO, Southern Poverty Law Center, is found to contain racial and ethnicity related hate ideologies. More recently, a multitude of hate activity has appeared on social media and networking sites such as Facebook, Twitter, and YouTube and extremist social media sites such as NewSaxon, all of which further facilitates the ease with which racial extremists link to one another.

It is not clear, however, whether or how the increase in online hate content affects offline racial hate crimes. There are a number of channels through which greater Internet availability may increase the number of hate crimes committed. For example, increased Internet access may increase the efficiency with which extremists can spread hate ideology and connect with likeminded members. Anecdotally, there is evidence that hate related material found on the Internet has led to hate crimes. For example, Benjamin Nathaniel Smith, who went on a shooting spree in nineteen ninety-nine that targeted racial and ethnic minorities, told a documentary film maker: "It wasn't really 'til I got on the Internet, read some literature of these groups that ... it really all came together." Another way in which greater Internet availability may increase the number of hate crimes committed is by facilitating the training of individuals to commit hate crimes. For example, the Tsarnaev brothers reportedly relied on online instructions to build the pressure cooker bombs used in the two thousand thirteen Boston marathon bombing. To the best of our knowledge there has been no systematic study about whether increased access to online hate content would increase offline hate crimes. In addition, it would be useful to get a better understanding of conditions under which offline hate crimes increase so as to motivate proper policy responses.

To empirically examine these issues, we use geographic and temporal variation in county-level broadband availability to study the effect of Internet penetration on hate crime in the United States between two thousand one and two thousand eight. We find evidence that increases in the number of broadband providers leads to increases in racial hate crimes, on average. The relationship between Internet access and these hate crimes further holds after using an instrumental variable approach to address endogeneity and is robust to a number of auxiliary checks and falsification tests. The positive relationship does not appear to be due to increased crime reporting or reclassification of crimes over time. The positive relationship between Internet penetration and offline racial hate crime is most evident in areas with higher levels of racism, as indicated by higher levels of segregation and higher propensity to search for racially charged words. On the other hand, we observe that Internet access does not have an impact on racial hate crimes in areas with lower levels of racism. We do not find any evidence that an increase in Internet access leads to an increase in local hate group formation, and the presence of a local hate group does not seem to strengthen the link between Internet penetration and hate crimes. However, Internet access appears to increase the incidence of racial hate crimes committed by "lone wolf" actors.

This paper aims to make the following contributions: First, we believe our study is the first to document the relationship between the Internet and hate crime using a large-scale dataset and econometric techniques. This finding should be of interest to an ongoing academic effort to document some of the downsides to increased online access that has been enabled by the platform nature of the Internet in connecting disparate groups of users. Second, we document conditions under which the positive relationship is present, which we believe can help motivate policy responses. Specifically, we focus on two salient factors-entropy scores and racially charged search terms-that show interesting moderating effects of the Internet on hate crime. We therefore believe that our findings should be of interest to policy-makers, interest groups, NGOs, and academics. Third, we provide insights into some plausible mechanisms driving the relationship between the Internet and hate crimes. In particular, our results appear to challenge the general notion that the Internet has played a role in the increase in hate group formation. Additionally, the analyses found some support that Internet-induced hate crimes arise mainly from lone-wolf perpetrators.

Two. Data

Three. Empirical Methodology

Three point one. Cross Sectional IV Specification

Three point two. IV Fixed Effects Specifications

Three point three Alternative Model Specifications

Four. Results

Four point two. Panel IV Regression Results

Five. Robustness Checks

Five point one. Results Using Alternate Models

Five point two. Results Using Additional Covariates and Removal of Outliers

Five point three. Checks on Crime Reporting and Classification

Six. Post Hoc Analyses

Seven. Discussion and Implications

Subsample Description:

Overview

The research empirically investigates how Internet penetration affects racial hate crimes, revealing that higher broadband availability correlates with increased hate crimes, especially in regions characterized by greater racial bias. The study also challenges the notion that increased online hate content leads to more organized hate group activities, instead identifying lone wolf offenders as a significant factor.

Key Points

1Broadband availability correlates with increased racial hate crimes
2The effect is stronger in areas with higher levels of racism
3No evidence found supporting a link to hate group formation
4The increase in hate crimes is mainly attributed to lone wolf perpetrators
5Study provides insights for policy responses to online hate influences

Details

Authors: Jason Chan, Anindya Ghose, Robert Seamans
Category: Social Sciences

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