Islamophobia in Cyberspace: Hate Crimes Go Viral

Cyber hate can take many different forms from online material which can lead to actual offline abuse and violence, cyber violence; cyber stalking, and online harassment with the use of visual images, videos, chat rooms, text and social media which are intended to cause harm. This book examines the case for current guidelines dealing with online anti-Muslim abuse and concludes that we require a new understanding of this online behaviour and the impact it can have on vulnerable communities. It is unique as it focuses on new technology in the form of social media and the Internet and explores the challenges the police and other agencies face when confronting anti-Muslim abuse in cyberspace. It also provides a critique of how people are targeted by online offenders and helps us understand online anti-Muslim behaviour in a much more detailed and comprehensive way by bringing together a range of experts who will examine this phenomenon and critically discuss why they think it has become so much more prevalent than it was before. Imran Awan is Deputy Director of the Centre for Applied Criminology at Birmingham City University, UK. He is the co-editor of Policing Cyber-Hate, Cyber-Threats and Cyber-Terrorism (Ashgate, 2012) and Extremism, Counter-terrorism and Policing (Ashgate, 2013). ’The issue of hate on the internet has emerged as one of the greatest challenges facing those charged with reducing harmful hate cases in our societies, particularly since the proliferation of social media. Muslims in Europe have felt this online hostility as keenly as other communities and this is a serious text that will be valuable to any reader looking to better understand the nature of anti-Muslim hostility and how it is expressed online.' Paul Giannasi, Manager of the UK Government Hate Crime Programme