Real-world events such as murders and political protests can trigger an increase in online hate speech directed against seemingly unrelated groups. The finding could help online moderators better predict when hateful content is most likely to be published, and what they should be looking out for, researchers say.
Three out of four children as young as 12 dislike their bodies and are embarrassed by the way they look, increasing to eight in 10 young people aged 18 to 21.
Battling far-right extremism, Germany has gone further than any other Western democracy to prosecute individuals for what they say online, testing the limits of free speech on the internet.
Social media and game platforms often use recommendation algorithms, find-a-friend tools, smartphone notices and other enticements to keep people glued online. But the same techniques may pose risks to scores of children who have flocked to online services that were not specifically designed for them.
Australian authorities have issued leading online platforms with legal documents ordering them to disclose how they are addressing the proliferation of child sexual exploitation material.
For years, Twitter’s problems were overshadowed by those of its much larger rival social network, Facebook. Not anymore: The past year has brought a parade of bad press for the blue bird, from the ouster of its CEO to an ownership battle with Elon Musk to a federal whistleblower complaint.
Incidents of children aged between seven and 10 being manipulated into recording abuse of themselves have surged by two-thirds over the past six months, according to a global report.
An insidious “far-right ecosystem” is targeting children in an attempt to radicalise them online, with experts warning that progressively younger school pupils are becoming ensnared in extremist ideologies, a Guardian investigation has found.
Global social media companies including TikTok, Twitter and Meta have signed a “world first” code of conduct that commits them to reducing the spread of harmful content in New Zealand, but some user-advocacy groups fear the code lacks any real bite.
Children as young as between three and six years old are becoming the latest victims in a growing trend of self-generated child sexual abuse, a report from an internet safety watchdog has said.