Posts by Roman Höfner
New Zealand is planning to designate O9A as a terrorist organization – and they are basing their assessment on the amazing reporting by @awinston.bsky.social in Wired and @hanrahan.tv on his podcast @popularfront.co. It's so good to see real expertise on extremism recognized in the political realm.
NEW: We’ve identified the man who runs the far-right troll account on X “HowlingMutant,” whose jokes about rape and the Holocaust have earned him nearly 200,000 followers, which include Vice President JD Vance. His name is Alexander Norden, from Rockaway Park in New York City.
We're trending on X now lmao
Die Schauspielerin Collien Fernandes kämpft seit Jahren gegen Fake-Pornografie im Internet. Jetzt hat sie ihren Ex-Mann Christian Ulmen angezeigt.
Unsere Titelgeschichte zu einem strukturellen Problem, über das in Deutschland noch immer zu wenig gesprochen wird: digitale sexualisierte Gewalt.
Next one down. @affeu.bsky.social also found connections to Germany.
@investigativ.bsky.social (da niemand anderes aus Eurem Haus hier zu sein scheint): WTF? Welche „Straßenschlachten“ bitte?
Die neue AfD-Jugendorganisation soll professioneller auftreten und weniger Skandale auslösen. Doch SPIEGEL-Recherchen zeigen: Hinter der Fassade tummeln sich mehr Radikale und Neonazis als in der alten.
Wichtige Recherche mit @mb-journalist.bsky.social & @johannesgrunert.bsky.social
Hopefully next week, we are working on it!
The internet was a mistake
As well as so many more I probably forgot...
For the UK and the US, you obviously have to follow @hanrahan.tv , @popularfront.co , @awinston.bsky.social and @ckd.sh as well as @jennefer.bsky.social and @decoherence.media , for Germany @affeu.bsky.social and @thilom.bsky.social , for Brazil @micheleprado.bsky.social and Romania Diana Mesesan
If you don't already follow @ctexposers.bsky.social
or @georgiaoost.bsky.social for any COM or other extemism news related stories from the Netherlands, you should do that! The best doc about COM imho and amazing research from Sweden has been done by @its-linus.bsky.social
Most importantly though, the people mentioned in this thread are not the only ones who have made big and important contributions and published important articles about this scene.
Unfortunately, Jay's death is not the only tragedy caused by this group. In order to get a grasp on how big the network is and how much harm they might have caused already, we also tried to find all known and public cases together with our great data journalists: www.spiegel.de/netzwelt/web...
Later, my colleague Max visited Jay's parents and they were so incredibly kind and trusting to share their and Jay's heartbreaking story with us - the story which is now on the cover of Der Spiegel.
Shortly after, a FBI agent working Jay's case, who had actually identified the German believed to hide behind the username White Tiger in 2022 already told Der Spiegel how he got frustrated with Hamburg's police because it took them so long to arrest him: www.spiegel.de/panorama/jus...
In June of this year, the German believed to be hiding behind White Tiger was finally arrested. He is believed to have tortured 30 victims and is charged with murder for the death of Jay Taylor. The video we saw in 2023 will be an important piece of evidence. www.spiegel.de/panorama/whi...
Month later, with @washingtonpost.com and @ckd.sh, Max and I published another piece in Der Spiegel about a different victim that was pushed into suicide by the group. We also mentioned White Tiger again and that he bragged about owning a suicide tutorial "to help the emo girls". shorturl.at/LO3GU
We did include White Tiger bragging about cp and exortions in our first report – we did not mention the video though. We did not have proof it was actually him taking part in the call. Just a profile pic that could have been used by anyone. We also did not know anything about the boy who died.
At some point during this time we stumbled upon a member called White Tiger, whom we identified as a 20 year-old from Germany. We also found a video that showed a young boy hanging himself on a video chat - and a profile watching it that used a profile picture White Tiger allegedly had used as well.
A lot has happened between 2021 and today: In 2023, @linaverschwele.bsky.social, Diana Mesesan, @awinston.bsky.social and I started looking into the sadistic cybergooming scene. @washingtonpost.com, @wired.com and @recorder.ro.web.brid.gy joined us and we published together 03/24. shorturl.at/XM0ou
Four years have passed since then and @maxhoppenstedt.bsky.social & I have just published our newest piece about the German member White Tiger and how he allegedly pushed Jay Taylor, a 13-year-old from the US, into hanging himself. It's the cover story of @spiegel.de print magazine this week.
New piece about Com/764! But beforehand – credit where credit is due: The first time I heard about 764 was from @hanrahan.tv in November of 2021. Jake had just learned that Angel Almeida might have been a member of a group with that name and that their members "get young girls to cut themselves"
Zeer indrukwekkend onderzoek van @spiegel.de over 'White Tiger': de 21-jarige Duitser die, via het sadistische Com-netwerk, de 13-jarige Jay Taylor overtuigde zelfmoord te plegen. www.spiegel.de/netzwelt/web...
I'm excited but a bit sad to announce that I've left Bellingcat to start a nonprofit investigative outlet focused on the far-right. We're called Decoherence Media, and we're launching today.