week 20 - Government funds research into social media hate crime after Brexit vote

The Government is funding research into social media hate crime in the wake of the vote to leave the European Union.  The research is in part a response to concerns that the Brexit vote and election of Donald Trump sparked an increase in hate speech online among a vocal minority of social media users. 

Cardiff University, which is carrying out the research, has received a £250,000 grant from the Economic and Social Research Council and is working with the National Police Chief's Council and Metropolitan Police to analyse the nature of hate speech in Britain and ways to mitigate it.  

"The referendum on the UK’s future in the European Union has galvanised certain prejudiced opinions held by a minority of people, resulting in a spate of hate crimes," said Professor Matthew Williams, the lead researcher on the project. "Many of these crimes are taking place on social media." 

Researchers will analyse the social media posts from the day of the referendum until a year later to see if and how hate speech spread after the vote. The researchers, who are experts at monitoring crime on social media, will use machine learning for their analysis. They will also look at the types of posts that do well on social networks and those that stop hate speech from spreading. 

"Over the coming period of uncertainty relating to the form of the UK’s exit, decision makers, particularly those responsible for minimising the risk of social disorder through community reassurance, local policing and online governance, will require near-real-time information on the likelihood of escalation of hateful content spread on social media," said Professor Williams. 

The goal of the research is to create a real-time monitoring tool that the Government can use to see how events spark online abuse, the kind of abuse and how to mitigate it.