A social media and messaging platform, popular among video game players, has once again run into controversy.
It follows the murder of conservative activist Charlie Kirk while he was speaking at Utah Valley University.
Tyler Robinson (22) is accused of firing a single rifle shot from a rooftop sniper’s nest that pierced Mr Kirk’s neck last Wednesday on the campus of Utah Valley University.
Mr Robinson is reported to have joked with friends about the fact that he resembled the person being sought by the FBI in the days after the shooting.
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According to the New York Times, he said in messages that his “doppelganger” was trying to “get me in trouble”, and joked that he needed to “get rid of this manifesto and exact copy rifle” that he had lying around.
Near the scene of the shooting, investigators found messages engraved into four bullet casings, which included references to memes and video game in-jokes.
One of the inscriptions, according to an affidavit, filed by authorities, read: “hey fascist! CATCH!” followed by a combination of directional arrows, an apparent reference to a sequence of button presses that unleashes a bomb in a popular video game, Helldivers 2.
The Washington Post and other media outlets reported that, shortly before he was arrested, a Discord account belonging to Mr Robinson posted a message: “Hey guys, I have bad news for you all ... It was me at UVU yesterday. im sorry for all of this.”
What is Discord?
Discord was introduced in 2015 by Jason Citron, a video game player and computer programmer. Mr Citron’s game development studio was struggling to find traction, so he created a chat application that people could use to communicate with one another while playing games.
The platform was considered a niche product until the pandemic, when young people were searching for ways to chat with their friends and joining online communities.
Discord is now estimated to have more than 200 million active users each month, up from 56 million in 2019.
What controversies is Discord linked to?
Discord has faced several controversies over the years regarding harmful content on its platform, including white nationalists organising a “unite the right” rally in Charlottesville in 2017 on Discord servers.
A gunman, Payton Gendron, who killed 10 people at a grocery stories in Buffalo, New York, in 2022 posted about his plans on the platform.
A recent article in the journal Frontiers in Psychology reported that extremists were using live-stream gaming platforms to target and radicalise vulnerable users, often young men.
What are Discord’s content moderation policies?
Discord said last week it had suspended Mr Robinson’s account for violating its “off-platform behaviour policy”.
“We strongly condemn violence of any kind, including political violence, and we will continue to co-ordinate closely with law enforcement,” it said.
Critics, however, say the app’s use by such suspects raises questions about the company’s moderation practices.
The company has previously said that 15 per cent of its more than 900 employees work on its trust and safety teams. Discord’s community guidelines prohibit hate speech, harassment, threats, violent extremism, child sexual abuse material and misinformation.
Enforcing its policies has been a challenging issue for Discord, particularly because of the small and private nature of many of its servers. – Agencies
