Center for Countering Digital Hate

The Center for Countering Digital Hate (CCDH), formerly Brixton Endeavors, is a British not-for-profit NGO

Campaigns

Campaign against Galloway and Hopkins

In January 2020, the CCDH campaigned against

CCDH's attempt to remove Galloway from Twitter failed, but Hopkins had her account suspended for a week in February 2020,[15] and removed permanently in July 2020.^[16]

Campaign against David Icke

In April 2020 the CCDH launched a campaign against the British conspiracy theorist

Originally called Stop Funding Fake News, the campaign asks advertisers to stop placing ads on web sites it argues are spreading misinformation ("

In March 2019, charity Macmillan Cancer Support removed an advertisement from The Canary Web site after complaints from the campaign and from others.^[23] The campaign maintained that The Canary promoted conspiracy theories, defended antisemitism, and published fake news.^[24] The Canary said changes to Google and Facebook's algorithms and the Stop Funding Fake News campaign led to The Canary downsizing its operations; it said that it was "against the actions of a state, not against Jewish people as an ethnic group" and that it had been "smeared with accusations of anti-Semitism by those who've weaponised the term for political ends".^[22][25][26] Labour Party MP Chris Williamson described the campaign against The Canary as "sinister".^[27]

Campaigns against Google advertisements for media organisations

The CCDH has campaigned to restrict the reach of the following media organisations by targeting their use of the Google advertising platform: Breitbart News, CNSNews, HotAir, Newsbusters, Newsmax, MRCTV, RedState, Twitchy, The Daily Wire, and Zero Hedge.^[28]

The CCDH notified Google that the Zero Hedge Web site had published what it called "racist articles" about the Black Lives Matter protests. As a result, in June 2020, Google found that reader comments on Zero Hedge breached its policies and banned Zero Hedge from its advertising platform.^[29]

Campaign against climate change deniers

In November 2021, a report by the CCDH identified "ten fringe publishers" that together were responsible for nearly 70 percent of Facebook user interactions with content that denied climate change. Facebook said the percentage was overstated and called the study misleading.^[30][31] The "Toxic Ten" publishers were: Breitbart News, The Western Journal, Newsmax, Townhall, Media Research Center, The Washington Times, The Federalist, The Daily Wire, RT, and The Patriot Post.^[31]

Campaign against spreaders of anti-vaccine disinformation

The Center has identified the top 12 spreaders of

In December 2022, the CCDH reported that the social media platform TikTok promoted self-harm and dieting content to users.^[35]

Twitter/X Corp.

In June 2023, the CCDH reported that after Elon Musk's acquisition of Twitter, the site "fails to act on 99% of hate posted by Twitter Blue subscribers".^[36] Twitter's successor company, X Corp. responded to this by filing a lawsuit against the CCDH on 31 July 2023, saying that they "falsely claim it had statistical support showing the platform is overwhelmed with harmful content."^[37] On March 25, 2024 District Judge Charles Breyer dismissed the case, writing that "This case is about punishing the Defendants for their speech."^[38][39][40]

Funding

The CCDH was reported in 2020 by the

In 2021 the Paul Hamlyn Foundation gave £100,000 to the CCDH.^{[42][non-primary source needed]}

In August 2023, Jim Jordan, the chair of the US House of Representatives Judiciary Committee, wrote to CCDH requesting the CCDH provide all documents and communications between the CCDH and the U.S. Executive branch and social media companies, a list of employees, contractors and grants received, to determine if the U.S. government "has coerced and colluded with companies and other intermediaries to censor speech".^[43][44] Responding to The Washington Post reporters, the CCDH denied receiving any funds from the United States government and provided documents it said showed its bipartisan approach.^[43]

Publications

• Don't Feed the Trolls: How to Deal with Hate on Social Media (2019) – a 12-page pamphlet on how Internet trolls operate, linked to a campaign of the same name involving Gary Lineker and other celebrities^{[45][46][47][48][49]}
• The Anti-Vaxx Industry (2020) – describes how social media platforms such as Facebook enable the growth of lucrative
  vaccine take-up, and recommends demonetisation as a strategy to respond to this.^{[50][51][52][53]}
• Will to Act (2020) – argues that the largest social media companies fail to enforce their own rules preventing anti-vaccine and COVID-19 conspiracy theory content[54]^[55][56]
• The Anti-Vaxx Playbook (2020) – explores anti-vaxx tactics, messages, and the use of social media^[57]
• Hatebook (2020) – co-authored by the
  Coalition for a Safer Web, accuses Facebook and Instagram of hosting 61 accounts that were selling neo-Nazi merchandise to fund far-right extremism.^[58]
• Failure to Act (2021) – jointly with Restless Development, tracks action taken by social media companies in response to anti-vaccine content^[59]
• Malgorithm (2021) – a critical analysis of Instagram and Facebook’s user engagement and content recommendation algorithm^{[60][61][62][63]}
• The Disinformation Dozen (2021) – identifies the top 12 spreaders of anti-vaccine disinformation on social media platforms.
  Biden administration in July 2021, in its criticism of Facebook and other social media companies for allowing pandemic disinformation to spread.^[66][43]
• The Toxic Ten (2021) – identifies "ten fringe publishers" that together were responsible for nearly 70 percent of Facebook user interactions with content that denied climate change.[30]^[31]

See also

• Internet censorship in the United Kingdom
• Stop Funding Hate, another British campaign with a similar methodology

References