White Nationalist Twitter Growing Faster Than ISIS: Report

Twitter users who identify themselves as white nationalists and neo-nazis have been growing faster than supporters of the Islamic State group, rising more than 600 percent in four years, according to a university study.

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The study from The Program on Extremism at The George Washington University analyzed accounts from prominent white nationalist organizations such as the American Nazi Party and the Ku Klux Klan. It found that from 2012 to 2016 these accounts had a 600 percent increase in followers, now estimated to stand at around 22,000 up from around 3,500 in 2012.

“There is substantial and growing evidence that white nationalism is enjoying a meaningful resurgence within the United States,” the report said.

The study also found that people who follow white nationalist accounts were unsurprisingly “invested in Donald Trump’s presidential campaign.” White nationalist followers used Trump hashtags more than any other white nationalist related hashtag except for #whitegenocide.

White nationalist and neo-nazi groups were also active in “trolling” other accounts and tweets with racist remarks and flooding “social media with negative content.” Many white nationalists and neo-nazi groups have not been shut down and use Twitter relatively free of censorship.

The study also investigated Islamic State Group sympathizers, who have traditionally used twitter as their “preferred social platform.” American white nationalist organizations now “outperform ISIS in nearly every social metric, from follower counts to tweets per day.”

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In an August crackdown against Islamic State Group sympathizers, the social media giant closed around 360,000 accounts because they believed that the accounts were advocating terrorism.

Despite the spike in followers on Twitter the report stated that, “white nationalists online do appear to inspire violence, a form of material participation, but not in a highly organized manner visible in open sources.”