Analysis: Hate speech on Facebook in Norway

Categories: News
Udgivet: 21 Mar - 2023

We and our partners have analyzed 10,4 million comments and detected the amount of hate speech on Facebook in Norway. Muslims and women are the groups who are targeted with most hate on Facebook.  

The public conversation has largely shifted to social media, where we all spend a lot of time. Hate speech has become a regular feature that is increasingly spreading. The conversation and presence in our digital democracy is not safe for everyone.

This is in line with the Norwegian Police Security Service’s threat assessment in recent years, where digital arenas are highlighted as the places where there is the greatest risk of being exposed to extreme and radicalizing messages.

“In Norway and the Nordic countries, we have a long tradition of good preventive measures, but we have been too slow to realize the extent of the polarization, extremism, and radicalization that is taking place online. That also entails that we have been too slow to transform our preventive systems to also apply in the digital world,” says Jeppe Albers, Executive Director of Nordic Safe Cities.

Click on the image to read the analysis.

Therefore, Nordic Safe Cities, with support from Gjensidigestiftelsen, has initiated an effort to create safe digital cities. We want find methods to prevent and counter hate speech on the internet and create a strong and good culture of expression.

Today we release the results of our analysis of the public conversation on Facebook in Norway.

We have investigated how much space hateful speech actually takes up, who it is directed towards, and where it is found.

Unique and comprehensive analysis of online hate speech 

The analysis is based on a unique algorithm and machine learning technology that Nordic Safe Cities has pioneered and can now introduce throughout the Nordic countries.

The machine learning technology will be made publicly available so that anyone who researches or works on digital prevention can use it.

The algorithm was developed by Analyse & Tall and Common Consultancy. It makes it possible to map linguistic attacks in the public debate on Facebook in Norwegian. The attack algorithm has analyzed more than 10,4 million comments on Norwegian Facebook pages of politicians, media, public figures, and on various debate sites.

Thus, this analysis represents the most comprehensive linguistic analysis of hate speech on the internet in Norway ever conducted.

“The amount of comments, as well as the precision of the algorithm in detecting hateful speech, makes the analysis unique. We now know exactly where the hate originates and who it is directed at,” says Jeppe Albers.

The report clearly shows that the way we debate and communicate on social media is a problem for democracy.

The analysis documents that 177,077 comments can be characterized as either linguistic attacks or hate speech. Most of the linguistic attacks and hate speech is found in the comment sections of politicians.

Hate speech is problematic, especially because some groups in society are more vulnerable to hate than others. Most of the hate speech is aimed at Muslims who are the targets of 29,7 % of the online hate speech. Women are second on the list of groups who receive the biggest amount of hate. 16,8 % of the hate is aimed at women.

The risk is that these groups – and others who the online hate targets – withdraw from the public conversation and are reluctant to engage politically. This makes the individual vulnerable, and at the same time, our democracy becomes poorer and less representative.

If those who use hate speech and undemocratic attacks against others are left unchallenged, this can reinforce a situation where even more people are reluctant to participate. More people can be influenced and believe in hateful and extreme narratives. In the extreme case, this can lead to radicalization and extremist acts and attacks.

“We must create a better culture of expression on Facebook and in our digital conversations. We want to be a leader in the work of creating new forms of digital prevention, which will make it safe for everyone to participate in the digital public conversation,” says Jeppe Albers, Director of Nordic Safe Cities.

For more information contact our Communications Manager, Johan Saugbjerg Haarløv, on +45 61 66 58 98 – or on johan@nordicsafecities.org