Racists, Terrorists Move to Social Networking to Spread Hate

If Time Magazine can name both the computer and "you" as Person of the Year, why can't the Internet win the Nobel Peace Prize? Perhaps because there's just as much hate involved on the Web as there is peace.

The BBC reported last week that the Internet is among 237 nominees for the Nobel Peace Prize. That's up from last year's 205 nominees.

However, although the Internet's nomination is supported by 2003 Nobel Peace Prize winner Shirin Ebadi as well as Nicholas Negroponte, the founder of the $100 laptop project, less than a week after it was first known that the Internet was up for a Nobel Peace Prize, the Simon Wiesenthal Center has released a report that shows that as well as for peace, the Internet is increasingly being used as an instrument of hate. It was SWC's 12th annual "Digital Terror and Hate Report."

One portion of the report describes how people who would previously sit at home stewing in their hatred can now access social networking sites for motivation and support, and instructions as well. After all, it's not as though it takes much Googling to find online instructions for just about anything.

Rabbi Abraham Cooper of the Simon Wiesenthal Center said:

"The last two years, we've seen an increase of almost 40 percent. We're looking at over 11,500 problematic websites -- Facebook, YouTube, etc. In 1995, the day of the Oklahoma City bombing, there was one.

"The Internet now plays a pivotal role in hooking up what's now called the 'lone wolf,' someone who's highly motivated and is encouraged not to join an organized group necessarily but to sort of carry out these acts. The power of the social networking, which is viral, has been co-opted in many cases by people who mean to do us harm and others who mean to recruit our children into a world of hate."

The Simon Wiesenthal Center was founded in 1977. It was named after Wiesenthal, who survived the Holocaust, only to became famous for his career as a Nazi war criminal hunter.