Gab Thwarts France’s Measures To Deny Access To French Neo-Nazi Incitement Website By Providing It With A Platform And Sharing Links To It; Enables French Users To Violate Antiracism Law And Others To Target French Political Figures

In a message posted June 7, 2023, Andrew Torba, founder and CEO of the extremist-adjacent social media platform Gab, claimed that the French government had reached out to him regarding a French profile posting hate speech on the platform. Torba’s post said that Gab’s response would be “the same as always” – that as a U.S.-based company, it does not “recognize or follow” foreign countries’ hate speech laws. The French government’s efforts come at the same time as a similar effort from the government of Germany, which has been attempting to crack down on content on Gab which contravenes German law. Torba has similarly rejected the requests of the German government. The MEMRI DTTM project also produced a report on German-language content on Gab and Torba’s refusal of requests from the German government.[1] Gab, an online safe haven for extremist content, is used by neo-Nazi and white supremacist groups from around the world to disseminate their hate content. Despite a significant effort to limit the impact of French groups online, many still use Gab freely, thanks to the protections afforded to them by the platform’s founder. A leading French neo-Nazi website is replete with unabashed antisemitic and racist content, and encourages antisemitic acts. For example, it recently provided an antisemitic leaflet for downloading, printing, and distribution across France. The site, which has been operating for years, changes its URL regularly to evade shutdown. In 2018, it was blocked by court decision for violent content, at the request of the Paris prosecutor. Nine access providers, including Orange, SFR (Altice Group, also owner of BFMTV), Free and Bouygues Télécom, were ordered to block access to it. It is suspected that the site’s main administrator is a Frenchman reportedly residing in Japan, who has multiple convictions and several search warrants against him. However, the site’s content can still be accessed via Gab. A number of Gab accounts enable users to connect to it by regularly posting updated links to its articles. Additionally, several French racist and antisemitic accounts operate freely on Gab in violation of French laws banning racism and antisemitism. The following report highlights examples of French accounts on Gab that disseminate content from the banned website along with other racist and antisemitic content.

via memri: Gab Thwarts France’s Measures To Deny Access To French Neo-Nazi Incitement Website By Providing It With A Platform And Sharing Links To It; Enables French Users To Violate Antiracism Law And Others To Target French Political Figures

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