The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) and the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) are coordinating with gaming companies to root out “domestic extremist content” among their player bases, a new government report suggests. According to the Government Accountability Office (GAO), a nonpartisan agency that audits other government departments on behalf of Congress, the FBI and DHS should use the same strategies that allow them to police extremism on social media to regulate the gaming industry.
The GAO report, entitled Countering Violent Extremism: FBI and DHS Need Strategies and Goals for Sharing Threat Information with Social Media and Gaming Companies, was compiled between September 2022 and January 2024. It was first published internally on January 31st and then released publicly on February 28th. Initial reporting on the document was provided by The Intercept.
At the request of the House Committee on Homeland Security, the GAO examined the methods by which “domestic violent extremists” use social media and gaming platforms, as well as how government agencies and gaming companies regulate and report possible threats.
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In the report, the GAO cites interviews with five entities within the gaming and social media industries: Roblox, a popular multiplayer game creation platform, Discord, a social app popular with gamers, Reddit, an online forum social network, and two gaming companies that asked the GAO to keep them anonymous.
Per the agency’s assessment:
The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) and the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) have mechanisms to share and receive domestic violent extremism threat-related information with social media and gaming companies.
The report also indicates that both the FBI and DHS have existing processes to communicate with gaming companies about “online activities promoting domestic violent extremism” or “activities that violate the companies’ terms of service.”
However, the GAO warns that the two law enforcement agencies lack an “overarching strategy” to judge the efficacy of these information-gathering efforts. It ends by urging both agencies to develop such a strategy. DHS officials concurred, estimating that this can be accomplished as early as June 28th.
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According to the GAO’s findings, “about 65 percent of Americans reported playing video games in 2023.” Citing data gathered by the Anti-Defamation League and the Southern Poverty Law Center—both of which contributed to the report—the GAO reported that “20 percent of adult gamers and 15 percent of young gamers reported being exposed to white supremacist ideologies in online games.”
Online extremists were found to use social media and gaming platforms primarily “to reach wide audiences, insert their extremist ideas into the mainstream, and radicalize, recruit, and mobilize others.”
Machine learning tools used by companies to police extremist speech were often insufficient to fully crack down on the content, and standards varied from platform to platform.
The United States government currently categorizes violent extremist incidents into five distinct groups based on motivation:
- Race or ethnicity
- Anti-government or anti-authority sentiment
- Animal rights or environmental sentiment
- Abortion-related issues
- Other domestic terrorism threats not otherwise defined or primarily motivated by the other categories
The full report from the Government Accountability Office can be read below:
Connor Walcott is a staff writer for Valuetainment.com. Follow Connor on X and look for him on VT’s “The Unusual Suspects.”
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