8chan: Philippines-based owner of extremist website lashes out as scrutiny intensifies over link to El Paso mass shooting

The owner of the extremist message board 8chan broke his silence in a defensive video statement that attempted to deflect blame for the role the platform plays in disseminating hate speech and inciting violence by lashing out at service providers, journalists and Instagram.

Jim Watkins, a US military veteran who lives in the Philippines, defended the website amid growing outcry over reports that the alleged El Paso gunman, as well as several other mass shooting suspects, used the site to publish white nationalist manifestos ahead of violent attacks.

“My company takes a firm stand on helping law enforcement, and within minutes of these two tragedies, we were working with FBI agents to find out what information we could to help in their investigations,” Watkins said, in a lengthy statement read over the sounds of the military bugle call Taps as he sat before a backdrop of Benjamin Franklin.

“We have never protected illegal speech, as it seems that we have been accused of by some less than credible journalists”, he added.

Watkins went on to denounce as “cowardly” the decision of infrastructure provider Cloudflare to stop providing 8chan with its services on Sunday, a move that has jeopardised 8chan’s ability to stay on the open internet.

After Cloudflare cut ties, other service providers followed suit on Monday; on Tuesday, a version of the site was available, but with severely limited functionality.