Towards Understanding the Evolution and Narratives of Online Fringe and Extreme Communities and their Influence on Mainstream Online Communities

现代网络存在各种各样的问题。具体来说，一些最令人担忧的问题是多种阴谋论和虚假信息的演变和传播，以及针对特定性别、种族和宗教的特定群体的极端和有毒社区。这些社区经常讨论政治上不正确和有争议的话题。由于大多数主流的在线社交网络（OSN）不允许在其平台上分享和讨论这些内容，因此遵守这些观点的人倾向于在4chan， Voat， Gab和Parler等非主流的OSN上创建社区，与志同道合的人交流。这些极端分子的信仰常常驱使他们犯下难以言喻的罪行。一个引人注目的案例是艾略特·罗杰（Elliot Rodger），他于2014年5月在加州持刀射杀了6人。肇事者是网络亚文化Incels的成员，并在网上被激进化。在现实世界中实现网络激进化的其他例子包括在学校、清真寺和其他公共场所发生的大量枪击事件。这些对人类生命的威胁凸显了研究和理解这些紧密结合的社区的必要性，其最终目标是减轻它们对现实世界的影响。除了这些极端事件之外，网络上还充斥着关于控制人民和政府的邪恶阴谋集团和秘密组织的在线讨论——阴谋论。尽管怀疑一直伴随着人类进化的生存动力，但在阴谋论的情况下，怀疑变得极端，并导致恐惧。阿菲尼亚指的是在没有证据的情况下，将先前不相关的想法和理论与事件联系起来。阴谋论的追随者分享他们偏执的、不切实际的想法，这些想法可能会引起恐慌，损害民主，并聚集其他毫无戒心的追随者。围绕COVID-19全球大流行的危险阴谋论的例子；pizzagate，将2016年美国总统候选人希拉里•克林顿（hillary Clinton）诬称为全球恋童癖团伙的主谋；QAnon，一个大胆定义的超级阴谋论，整合了许多阴谋论。许多研究和新闻媒体解释了阴谋论对民主国家和公众构成的危险和威胁。更具体地说，像QAnon这样的阴谋论被证明对民主是极其危险的，因为政府官员和媒体经常参与启动或促进阴谋论，以有利于他们的政治议程和利益。一个典型的例子是2020年1月6日，一群支持卡农和亲特朗普的暴徒袭击了美国国会大厦，试图让唐纳德·特朗普恢复美国总统的职位，但以失败告终。具体来说，联邦调查局将QAnon运动描述为国内恐怖威胁，将其追随者描述为“国内极端分子”。为此，我们的研究兴趣集中在理解和表征有毒的、极端的和边缘的在线社区。我们感兴趣的是分析和描述这些社区创建的内容，以及这些内容是如何在网络上传播的。因此，揭示了毫无防备的社区和个人在接触到这些内容、有针对性的突袭攻击、虚假信息和阴谋论时是如何受到影响的。我们打算分析这些社区在主流和非主流osn上创建和分享的内容，以研究它们如何相互影响，以及用户如何与不同平台上的各种社区联系在一起。值得注意的是，我们打算部署最先进的工具来描述这些社区：主题、情感和立场检测、恶作剧处理、命名实体识别、词嵌入、潜在分析、毒性、先进的机器和深度学习以及图像处理技术。我们的目标是了解和描述这些社区创建的内容，他们如何渗透到其他毫无戒心的在线社区，以及他们如何影响他们。最后，我们将研究可能的缓解机制。

The modern Web suffers from various issues. Specifically, some of the most worrying issues are the evolution and dissemination of multiple conspiracy theories and disinformation, extreme and toxic communities targeting specific groups of particular sex, race, and religion. These communities often discuss politically incorrect and controversial topics. Since most mainstream online social networks (OSN) do not allow this content to be shared and discussed on their platforms, people that abide by these opinions tend to create communities in non-mainstream OSNs like 4chan, Voat, Gab, and Parler to communicate with like-minded people. The beliefs of these extremists often drive them to commit unspeakable crimes. A compelling case is Elliot Rodger, who killed six people in a stabbing and shooting spree in California in May 2014. The perpetrator was a member of the online subculture of Incels and was radicalized online. Other examples of radicalization online realized in the real world include the numerous shootings in schools, mosques, and other public spaces. These threats to human life highlight the need to study and understand these tightly-knit communities with the ultimate goal of mitigating the impact they have on the real world. In addition to these extreme events, the Web buzzes with online chatter about evil cabals and secret organizations that control people and governments - conspiracy theories. Although suspicion has always been with the human race powered by our evolutionary drive to survive, it becomes extreme in the case of conspiracy theories and leads to apophenia. Apophenia refers to the notion of connecting previously unconnected ideas and theories with events without proof. Conspiracy theory adherents share their paranoid, unrealistic ideas that may cause panic, harm democracies, and gather other unsuspecting followers. Examples of dangerous conspiracy theories surround the COVID-19 global pandemic; pizzagate, which frames the 2016 US presidential candidate Hilary Clinton as the mastermind of global pedophile rings; and QAnon, a boldly defined super conspiracy theory, which integrates many conspiracy theories. Many studies and news press outlets explain the dangers and threats conspiracy theories pose to democracies and the general public. More specifically, conspiracy theories, like QAnon, proved to be extremely dangerous towards democracies as government officials and media often get involved in starting or promoting them to benefit their political agendas and interests. A prime example is January 6, 2020, when a pro-Qanon and pro-Trump mob stormed the US Capitol in a failed attempt to reinstate Donald Trump as the president of the US. Specifically, the FBI describes the QAnon movement as a domestic terror threat and its followers as "domestic extremists." To this end, we focus our research interests on understanding and characterizing toxic, extreme, and fringe communities online. We are interested in analyzing and describing the content these communities create and how it is disseminated across the Web. Thus, shedding light on how unsuspecting communities and individuals get affected when exposed to such content, targeted raid attacks, and disinformation and conspiracy theories. We intend to analyze the content these communities create and share on mainstream and non-mainstream OSNs to investigate how they affect each other and how users are linked to various communities on different platforms. Notably, we intend to deploy state-of-the-art tools to characterize these communities: topic, sentiment, and stance detection, hoaxes processes, named entity recognition, word embeddings, latent analysis, toxicity, and advanced machine and deep learning and image processing techniques. We aim to understand and characterize the content these communities create, how they penetrate other online unsuspecting communities, and how they influence them. Last, we target to investigate possible mitigation mechanisms.