James Banks

Regulating hate speech online

The exponential growth in the Internet as a means of communication has been emulated by an increase in far-right and extremist web sites and hate based activity in cyberspace. The anonymity and mobility afforded by the Internet has made harassment and expressions of hate effortless in a landscape that is abstract and beyond the realms of traditional law enforcement. This paper examines the complexities of regulating hate speech on the Internet through legal and technological frameworks. It explores the limitations of unilateral national content legislation and the difficulties inherent in multilateral efforts to regulate the Internet. The paper develops to consider how technological innovations can restrict the harm caused by hate speech while states seek to find common ground upon which to harmonise their approach to regulation. Further, it argues that a broad coalition of government, business and citizenry is likely to be most effective in reducing the harm caused by hate speech.

Foreign National Prisoners in the UK: Explanations and Implications

This article examines the rapid expansion of the foreign national prison population in the UK against a backdrop of public and political anxiety about immigration and crime. It explores official data considering some of the possible explanations for the growth in the number of foreign national prisoners and the implications this has for penal management. Whilst increases in both the number of foreign nationals entering the UK and the number of foreign nationals in UK prisons has strengthened the association between immigration and crime in the public imagination, there is little empirical evidence to suggest that foreign nationals are more dangerous than British nationals. Instead, the growth of the foreign national prison population appears to stem from a number of sources that may operate alone or in tandem.

Edging your bets: Advantage play, gambling, crime and victimisation

Consumerism, industrial development and regulatory liberalisation have underpinned the ascendance of gambling to a mainstream consumption practice. In particular, the online gambling environment has been marketed as a site of ‘safe risks’ where citizens can engage in a multitude of different forms of aleatory consumption. This paper offers a virtual ethnography of an online ‘advantage play’ subculture. It demonstrates how advantage players have reinterpreted the online gambling landscape as an environment saturated with crime and victimisation. In this virtual world, advantage play is no longer simply an instrumental act concerned with profit accumulation to finance consumer desires. Rather, it acts as an opportunity for individuals to engage in a unique form of edgework, whereby the threat to one’s well-being is tested through an ability to avoid crime and victimisation. This paper demonstrates how mediated environments may act as sites for edgeworking and how the potential for victimisation can be something that is actively engaged with.

European regulation of cross-border hate speech in cyberspace: The limits of legislation

This article examines the complexities of regulating hate speech on the Internet through legal frameworks. It demonstrates the limitations of unilateral national content legislation and the difficulties inherent in multilateral efforts to regulate the Internet. The article highlights how the US commitment to free speech has undermined European efforts to construct a truly international regulatory system. It is argued that a broad coalition of citizens, industry and government, employing technological, educational and legal frameworks, may offer the most effective approach through which to limit the effects of hate speech originating from outside of European borders.

Gambling, crime and society

This book explores the manifold actual, possible and probable interconnections between gambling and crime in the context of the increased availability of wagering activities across many regions of the world. It examines the impact of the proliferation and propinquity of land-based betting establishments on crime, the role of organised crime in the provision of both licit and illicit forms of gambling, as well as problem gambling, crime and the administration of criminal justice. It also assesses the links between gambling, sport and corruption and the dimensions of crime that takes place in and around internet gambling sites. A thought-provoking study, this will be of particular interest to scholars in the fields of sociology, criminology and social policy.

The Heartbleed bug: Insecurity repackaged, rebranded and resold

The emergence of a post-industrial information economy shaped by and around networked communication technology has presented new opportunities for identity theft. In particular, the accidental leakage or deliberate harvesting of information, via either hacking or social engineering, is an omnipresent threat to a large number of commercial organisations and state agencies who manage digital databases and sociotechnical forms of data. Throughout the twenty-first century the global media have reported on a series of data breaches, fuelling anxiety among the public concerning the safety and security of their personal and financial data. With concern outpacing reliable information, a reassurance gap has emerged between the public’s expectations and the state’s ability to provide safety and security online. This disparity presents a significant opportunity for a commercial computer crime control industry that has sought to position itself as being able to offer consumer citizens the antidotes for such ills. This paper considers how neoliberal discourses of cybercrime control are packaged, branded and sold, through an examination of the social construction of the Heartbleed bug. It demonstrates how security company Codenomicon masterfully communicated the vulnerability, the product of a simple coding error, through its name, a logo and an accompanying website, in turn shaping news coverage across the mainstream media and beyond.

Towards Global Gambling

This chapter documents the proliferation of gambling opportunities across many jurisdictions of the world. It illustrates that whilst these changes are by no means uniform or universal, in Europe, North America, Australasia and parts of Asia, the liberalisation of gambling laws and policy has led to the widespread availability of a panoply of different gambling products and services. Pertinently, low potency non-continuous forms of gambling have been superseded by high potency continuous forms of gambling – such as electronic gaming machines, casino games and scratch cards – leading to an escalation in consumption. In such jurisdictions, gambling is highly prevalent, profitable and potent, as evinced by continued growth in citizen’s expenditure, industry profits and state taxation revenues. Yet as opportunities for gambling have multiplied, concerns regarding the public health impacts associated with this activity have increased. The chapter notes how the widespread availability of gambling is associated with a multitude of serious harms for individuals, families and society including underage gambling, increased rates of problem and pathological gambling, unemployment, debt, deterioration in personal health and self-esteem, familial dysfunction, family breakdown, and crime and victimisation. The chapter also details the academic rationale and structure of the book.

Internet Gambling, Crime and the Regulation of Virtual Environments

The chapter explores the dimensions of crime that takes place in and around Internet gambling sites and crime that is associated with remote gambling, demonstrating how online gambling can act as a cause of crime, as a conduit for crime or support other criminal activities. The chapter illustrates how there are a number of observable threats posed by online gambling to site operators, consumers and wider society. Opportunities for illegal gambling, money laundering, and fraud and theft are present, as are risks posed by cyber-extortionists. The chapter also examines the ongoing efforts of international organisations, national governments, industry regulators and operators, gamers, and other national and international bodies to address the threats posed by the development of Internet gambling markets across the globe.

Veterans and violence: An exploration of pre-enlistment, military and post-service life:

Despite growing criminological interest in the many ex-service personnel mired within the UK’s criminal justice system, there remains a paucity of qualitative research studies examining the (violent) veteran offender. In response, this paper mobilizes the voices of veterans to explore the key life events that can shape their offending behaviour. Countering reductionist explanations of violent crime committed by ex-service personnel, we contend that veterans’ violence may be rooted within personal biographies and psyches, conditioned by military experiences and represent the psychosocial consequences of the socioeconomic transformations of advanced capitalism.

Organised Crime, Gambling and Illegal Gambling

This chapter explores the degree to which organised crime groups are involved in both licit and illicit forms of gambling across the globe. It offers a brief historical account of organised crime and its relationship with gambling, before turning to consider how and to what extent the two phenomena are linked in contemporary societies. It examines the degree to which organised crime groups are involved in the illegal supply of gambling services and the legal provision of gambling, and how they exploit legal forms of gambling for nefarious activities. The chapter also highlights how the involvement of organised crime in the business of gambling has, on occasion, led to the corruption of law enforcement officers and other government officials in certain regions of the world.