Papadamou, K;
Zannettou, S;
Blackburn, J;
De Cristofaro, E;
Stringhini, G;
Sirivianos, M;
(2021)
"how over is it?" Understanding the Incel Community on YouTube.
In:
Proceedings of the ACM on Human-Computer Interaction.
(pp. pp. 1-25).
ACM
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Abstract
YouTube is by far the largest host of user-generated video content worldwide. Alas, the platform has also come under fire for hosting inappropriate, toxic, and hateful content. One community that has often been linked to sharing and publishing hateful and misogynistic content are the Involuntary Celibates (Incels), a loosely defined movement ostensibly focusing on men's issues. In this paper, we set out to analyze the Incel community on YouTube by focusing on this community's evolution over the last decade and understanding whether YouTube's recommendation algorithm steers users towards Incel-related videos. We collect videos shared on Incel communities within Reddit and perform a data-driven characterization of the content posted on YouTube. Among other things, we find that the Incel community on YouTube is getting traction and that, during the last decade, the number of Incel-related videos and comments rose substantially. We also find that users have a 6.3% chance of being suggested an Incel-related video by YouTube's recommendation algorithm within five hops when starting from a non Incel-related video. Overall, our findings paint an alarming picture of online radicalization: not only Incel activity is increasing over time, but platforms may also play an active role in steering users towards such extreme content.
| Type: | Proceedings paper |
|---|---|
| Title: | "how over is it?" Understanding the Incel Community on YouTube |
| Event: | ACM on Human-Computer Interaction |
| Open access status: | An open access version is available from UCL Discovery |
| DOI: | 10.1145/3479556 |
| Publisher version: | https://doi.org/10.1145/3479556 |
| Language: | English |
| Additional information: | This version is the author accepted manuscript. For information on re-use, please refer to the publisher's terms and conditions. |
| UCL classification: | UCL UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > UCL BEAMS UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > UCL BEAMS > Faculty of Engineering Science UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > UCL BEAMS > Faculty of Engineering Science > Dept of Computer Science |
| URI: | https://discovery.ucl.ac.uk/id/eprint/10139709 |
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