Reports

• January 28, 2009 – The National Hispanic Media Coalition (NHMC) filed a petition for inquiry at the FCC, asking it to examine hate speech in media, and a letter at the NTIA, asking it to update its 1993 report, The Role of Telecommunications in Hate Crimes.
 

• April 7, 2009 – DHS released an extremism assessment; the assessment reported that extremists “have adopted the immigration issue as a call to action, rallying point, and recruiting tool” and that “anti-immigration or strident pro-enforcement fervor has been directed against specific groups” and “has the potential to incite individuals or small groups toward violence.” Rush Limbaugh decried the report, saying, "There is not one instance they can cite as evidence where any of these right-wing groups have done anything."
 

• May 31, 2009 – Dr. George Tiller was gunned down in Wichita, KS, while serving as an usher at church; Tiller had been repeatedly referred to as “Dr. Tiller the Baby Killer” on mainstream media outlets.
 

• June 11, 2009 – White supremacist James von Brunn shot and killed an African American security guard at the Holocaust museum in Washington, DC; hateful messages against Jews and African Americans were found in von Brunn’s vehicle.
 

• June 12, 2009 – Minutemen leader Shawna Forde murdered 9-year-old Brisenia Flores and her father in Arivaca, AZ; Forde broke into their home dressed as a law enforcement officer, looking for money and drugs to finance her vigilante border watch group.
 

• July 2, 2009 – Forty civil rights and public interest organizations requested that the FCC act on NHMC’s petition for inquiry.
 

• July 28, 2009 – Neo-Nazi radio host Hal Turner was arrested for his Internet postings encouraging violence against three 7th Circuit Court of Appeals judges; the postings included photographs, phone numbers, work address and room numbers of the judges, along with a photo of the building in which they work and a map of its location; Turner wrote, “Let me be the first to say this plainly: These judges deserve to be killed.”
 

• August 11, 2009 – Forty organizations submitted a joint letter to the NTIA, requesting that it update its 1993 report on The Role of Telecommunications in Hate Crimes.
 

• Late August/Early September 2009 – Glenn Beck’s advertisers fled from his cable news program after learning that their money was supporting Beck’s racist tirades.
 

• September 23, 2009 – Mario Vera was viciously beaten by men yelling racial slurs in Brooklyn, NY. This was the second anti-Latino attack in a year to occur in the Bushwick neighborhood.
 

• November 11, 2009 – Lou Dobbs resigned from CNN after Latino groups organized to pressure CNN to either make Dobbs return to credible journalism or to fire him.
 

• December 2009 – Representative Luis Gutierrez (D-IL) introduced a bill for comprehensive immigration reform.
 

• February 2010 – More than a year has passed since NHMC requested that the FCC and NTIA examine the relationship between hate speech and hate crimes. During the agencies’ year-long delay countless Latinos have been killed and maimed. As Congress takes up immigration reform this year, Latinos across the country are left to live in fear that the dramatic increase in violence spurred by the angry rhetoric surrounding the 2006 immigration debate will reoccur.

On behalf of the Online Safety and Technology Working Group (OSTWG), we are pleased to transmit this report to you.   As mandated, we reviewed and evaluated:

1. The status of industry efforts to promote online safety through educational efforts, parental control technology, blocking and filtering software, age-appropriate labels for content or other technologies or initiatives designed to promote a safe online environment for children;
2. The status of industry efforts to promote online safety among providers of electronic communications services and remote computing services by reporting apparent child pornography, including any obstacles to such reporting;
3. The practices of electronic communications service providers and remote computing service providers related to record retention in connection with crimes against children; and
4. The development of technologies to help parents shield their children from inappropriate material on the Internet.

The report contains recommendations in each of the above categories, as well some general recommendations. We believe these recommendations will further advance our collective goal to provide a safer online experience to our children. Click here to view full report.