Edited by Joseph B. Walther and Ronald E. Rice

This book explores the social forces among and between online aggressors that affect the expression and perpetration of online hate. Its chapters illustrate how patterns of interactive social behavior reinforce, magnify, or modify this expression. It also considers the characteristics of social media that facilitate social interactions that promote hate and facilitate relationships among haters. Bringing together a range of international experts and covering an array of themes, including woman abuse, antisemitism, pornography, radicalization, and extreme political youth movements, this book examines the specific social factors and processes that facilitate these forms of hate and proposes new approaches for explaining them. Cutting-edge, interdisciplinary, and authoritative, this book will be of interest to sociologists, criminologists, and scholars of media, communication, and computational social science alike, as well as those engaged with hate crime, hate speech, social media, and online social networks.

London; New York: Routledge, 2025.

By Joe Caluori, Violette Gadenne, Elen Kirk, and Beth Mooney

The National Crime Agency published its first intelligence assessment of county lines in 2015.  Ever since, there has been a growing interest in county lines from the media, public policy, and the world of research. Crest Advisory has published research that has contributed to the body of evidence, among other things, on the socio-economic determinants of individual vulnerability to exploitation, shining light on ways to mitigate those risks. This project, however, takes a different approach, by honing in on the specific role played by technology in county lines. In this report, ‘technology’ is used to refer to electronic or digital devices or services predominantly those used for personal communication. By including devices and services in our definition we incorporate both physical hardware such as mobile phones or smartwatches, and software such as applications provided by social media platforms. Technology plays an ever-increasingly important role in our day-to-day lives. Data from the Office for National Statistics (ONS) show that the proportion of adults who use the internet daily has increased from 35 percent of the UK population in 2006 to 89 percent in 2020. The nature of this usage has also changed dramatically, with social media increasing in influence significantly over the years. In 2021 TikTok, a social media platform designed for sharing short videos, overtook Google for the first time as the most popular site worldwide.5 Just as modern technologies are now an essential aspect of modern society, technology is intrinsic to the county lines model. The mobile phone, or the ‘line’ it facilitates, enables communications between those running the lines, those distributing the drugs, and those buying and using the drugs. Current approaches to disrupting county lines rely heavily on mobile communications technology (e.g. cell site analysis, or digital forensics gained from burner phones, personal smartphones, or other digital devices). However, the role of technology as an enabler of child criminal exploitation (CCE) is both under-represented and poorly understood in published research and literature. The Government has announced an intention to “cut the head off the snake” of county 6 lines. To understand what is required to do this, it is necessary to explore the dynamics of the country lines model, as well as examine its weaknesses. There is an acute need to better understand and monitor technological evolutions within county lines and analyze their implications for CCE. Only by understanding and responding to the role of technology can the Government and law enforcement leaders produce an effective national plan to ‘cut the head off the snake’ of county lines. Recent public policy developments have put the role technology plays in enabling crime in sharp focus. Social media and online platforms have seen perhaps the most dramatic rise in interest. Even though at the time this report is being drafted, the Online Safety Bill has been put on hold, much ink has been spilled on its value, its potential impact on privacy, and what should be included in such legislation. High-profile cases, such as the events leading to the 6th January attack on the United States Capitol in 2021, have shown the potential harm that can be caused by online communication. More generally, as we become more and more dependent on tech for all aspects of our lives, it is crucial that law enforcement keeps pace with its development concerning crime

London: Crest Advisory, 2022. 37p.

By Pablo Ruiz, Sergio Cabrales, Andrés Medaglia, Olga Sarmiento

Bicycle theft and robbery affect the number of bicycle users because since repetitive occurrence of these crimes may stop victims from bicycling. Interest in studying these particular crimes has grown in the past few years and studies have focused on analyzing preventive measures. Criminology theories have been the base for these studies as they associate different factors of the environment and social behavior with the occurrence of criminal activities. This paper aims to analyze bicycle theft and robbery in the city of Bogotá, Colombia using a fixed effects Poisson model for panel data between 2014 and 2017. Different environmental factors such as violent crimes, public amenities, land use features, and socioeconomic attributes, were evaluated against the occurrence of these incidents within specified areas that divide the city. Results show that violent areas increase the risk of bicycles being stolen, as well as areas with a high number of bicycle racks and bus stations. Additionally, results show that there is no significant evidence that socioeconomic differences are determinants to the occurrence of these crimes. The results of this study are relevant to potential policy measures regarding bicycle theft and robbery prevention, which range from security measures in certain areas given the evident relation that violence has on these crimes, crime hot spot intervention and environmental design towards crime prevention. 

Unidas, 2018. 

By Olivia Mercier, Sarah Yu Fu, Rachel Filler, Alexie Leclerc, Kari Sampsel, Karine Fournier, Mark Walker, Shi Wu Wen, Katherine Muldoon

Background: Intimate partner violence (IPV) is a prevalent global health problem. IPV that occurs before pregnancy often continues during the perinatal period, resulting in ongoing violence and many adverse maternal, obstetrical, and neonatal outcomes.

Objectives: This scoping review is designed to broadly capture all potential interventions for perinatal IPV and describe their core components and measured outcomes.

Search Methods: We conducted a search for empirical studies describing IPV interventions in the perinatal population in June 2022. The search was conducted in MEDLINE, EMBASE, PsycInfo, CINAHL, Cochrane Central Register of Controlled Trials, Web of Science, Applied Social Sciences Index & Abstracts, ClinicalTrials.gov and MedRxiv. Hand-searching of references from select articles was also performed.

Selection Criteria: Included studies described an intervention for those experiencing IPV during the perinatal period, including 12 months before pregnancy, while pregnant or in the 12 months post-partum. The search encompassed January 2000 to June 2022 and only peer-reviewed studies written in either English or French were included. Included interventions focused on the survivor exposed to IPV, rather than healthcare professionals administering the intervention. Interventions designed to reduce IPV revictimization or any adverse maternal, obstetrical, or neonatal health outcomes as well as social outcomes related to IPV victimization were included.

Data Collections and Analysis: We used standard methodological procedures expected by The Campbell Collaboration.

Main Results: In total, 10,079 titles and abstracts were screened and 226 proceeded to full text screening. A total of 67 studies included perinatal IPV interventions and were included in the final sample. These studies included a total of 27,327 participants. Included studies originated from 19 countries, and the majority were randomized controlled trials (n = 43). Most studies were of moderate or low quality. Interventions included home visitation, educational modules, counseling, and cash transfer programs and occurred primarily in community obstetrician and gynecologist clinics, hospitals, or in participants' homes. Most interventions focused on reducing the revictimization of IPV (n = 38), improving survivor knowledge or acceptance of violence, knowledge of community resources, and actions to reduce violence (n = 28), and improving maternal mental health outcomes (n = 26). Few studies evaluated the effect of perinatal IPV interventions on obstetrical, neonatal, or child health outcomes.

Authors' Conclusion(s): The majority of intervention studies for perinatal IPV focus on reducing revictimization and improving mental health outcomes, very few included obstetrical, neonatal, and other physical health outcomes. Future interventions should place a larger emphasis on targeting maternal and neonatal outcomes to have the largest possible impact on the lives and families of IPV survivors and their infants.

Campbell Systematic Reviews, Volume 20, Issue 3, September 2024

By Sanna Bergvall, Núria Rodríguez-Planas:

Most empirical studies indicate that becoming a mother is an augmenting factor for the perpetration of intimate partner violence (IPV). Using rich population-wide hospital records data from Sweden, we conduct a stacked DiD analysis comparing the paths of women two years before and after the birth of their first child with same-age women who are several quarters older when giving birth to their first child and find that, in contrast to the consensus view, violence sharply decreases with pregnancy and motherhood. This decline has both a short-term and longer-term component, with the temporary decline in IPV covering most of the pregnancy until the child is 6 months old, mimicking a temporary decrease in hospital visits for alcohol abuse by the children's fathers. The more persistent decline is driven by women who leave the relationship after the birth of the child. Our evidence is not supportive of alternative mechanisms including suspicious hospitalizations, an overall reduction in hospital visits or selection in in seeking medical care, mothers’ added value as the main nurturer, or mothers’ drop in relative earnings within the household. Our findings suggest the need to push for public health awareness campaigns underscoring the risk of victimization associated with substance abuse and to also provide women with more support to identify and leave a violent relationship

Bonn: Institute of Labor Economics - IZA, 2024

By Julia Tolmie, Rachel Smith, and Denise Wilson

How intimate partner violence (IPV) is conceptualized affects what we see when we look at situations involving IPV and what we think the solutions to the problem of IPV are—either in individual cases or in the development of broader legal and policy responses. In this article, it is suggested that while conceptualizing IPV as coercive control is an improvement over previous understandings, it does not go far enough. Coercive control must be located within a broader conceptualization of IPV as a form of social and systemic entrapment if it is not to operate in a harmful manner for victim-survivors.

Violence Against WomenVolume 30, Issue 1, January 2024, Pages 54-74

By Ido Kilovaty

The Colonial Pipeline ransomware attack, which shut down gas supply to the entire East Coast back in May 2021, has sparked debate as to the regulation of the pipeline’s cybersecurity. After ten years of inaction on the matter, the Transportation Security Administration (TSA) has issued two mandatory directives on pipeline cybersecurity. This Article delves into the propriety of the TSA as a pipeline security regulator, as well as the incomplete and ineffective approach currently laid out in the TSA’s pipeline cybersecurity directives. This Article argues that there may be other agencies more suitable for the task, such as the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission, acting under the auspices of the Department of Energy. It also provides specific recommendations as to the substance of any prospective pipeline cybersecurity regulation, such as the creation of more open-ended and flexible cybersecurity objectives as opposed to the current approach of prescriptive standards.

Houston Law Review, Vol. 60, 2023, Kilovaty, Ido, Cybersecuring the Pipeline (March 29, 2022). Houston Law Review, Vol. 60, 2023,

By Ido Kilovaty

Generative AI platforms, like ChatGPT, hold great promise in enhancing human creativity, productivity, and efficiency. However, generative AI platforms are prone to manipulation. Specifically, they are susceptible to a new type of attack called “prompt injection.” In prompt injection, attackers carefully craft their input prompt to manipulate AI into generating harmful, dangerous, or illegal content as output. Examples of such outputs include instructions on how to build an improvised bomb, how to make meth, how to hotwire a car, and more. Researchers have also been able to make ChatGPT generate malicious code. This article asks a basic question: do prompt injection attacks violate computer crime law, mainly the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act? This article argues that they do. Prompt injection attacks lead AI to disregard its own hard-coded content generation restrictions, which allows the attacker to access portions of the AI that are beyond what the system’s developers authorized. Therefore, this constitutes the criminal offense of accessing a computer in excess of authorization. Although prompt injection attacks could run afoul of the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act, this article offers ways to distinguish serious acts of AI manipulation from less serious ones, so that prosecution would only focus on a limited set of harmful and dangerous prompt injections.

Loyola of Los Angeles Law Review, Vol. 58, 2025, Kilovaty, Ido, Hacking Generative AI (March 1, 2024). Loyola of Los Angeles Law Review, Vol. 58, 2025,