In places like Washington, D.C. and New York City, apps such as SketchFactor  (an app used to report “sketchy” people) and GhettoTracker.com are gaining traction with users. With these applications, Black people are being reported at an alarming rate. With GhettoTracker.com, users of the online platform are asked to rate neighborhoods based on whether they feel that the areas are “safe” or “ghetto”.

In Washington, a movement titled “Operation GroupMe” has become prevalent in the Georgetown area of D.C. It was created last February out of Georgetown Business Improvement District’s partnership with the local police to initiate “real-time mobile-based group-messaging app that connects Georgetown businesses, police officers and community members.” The app has nearly 400 users who racially profile countless innocent Black people.

The white supremacists of these online communities  even communicate with each other in code, referring to Melanoid people as “aa”–an abbreviation for African-American. It has been reported that hundreds of photos of unsuspecting Black people have been shared in these groups. On one occasion, a Black female employee of retailer American Apparel  (wearing orange) took a selfie with an unsuspecting shopper in the background with a caption that read: “Look out for these girls. Known thefts.” After another user commented on the employee’s selfie, stating that “Only known thieves would smile for the camera.” The actual manager of the store left a following comment that read, “Yea, not to be confused, girl in orange is our employee.”

One of the more alarming facts surrounding this issue is that these apps are being implemented in U.S. metropolitan areas (Bay Area, D.C., New York) that are being notoriously gentrified, with suspected white supremacists new to these areas reacting out of paranoia of contrived Black threats to their neighborhoods.

For more on this story, follow this link.

B. Clark

]]> https://www.melanoidnation.org/phone-apps-used-to-promote-systematic-white-racism-is-on-the-rise/feed/ 63 https://www.melanoidnation.org/white-supremacy-theres-an-app-for-that/ https://www.melanoidnation.org/white-supremacy-theres-an-app-for-that/#comments Fri, 09 Oct 2015 18:05:18 +0000 http://melanoidnation.org/?p=2658 OAKLAND, CA — This Bay Area city in California was once known for being a proud hub of Black culture, as it was also had a reputation of being one of the United States’ “Chocolate Cities”.

Today, it seems that Oakland–in conjunction with the natural effects that time causes–has changed drastically.

As suspected white supremacists continue to move into the area, many of them have resorted to being part of an online community, ran by nextdoor.com. The website, which was developed in nearby San Francisco in 2010, has seen a sharp uptick in usage of the web platform. 176 neighborhoods (and 20 percent of all households in the city) in Oakland have groups registered on Nextdoor. The site, which is known as “the private social network for neighborhoods”, allows people to report “suspicious activity.”

Of course, much of the reporting on Nextdoor involves reporting innocent Black people as being suspects for merely engaging in non-criminal/pedestrian activity, such as walking down the street. Many of the area’s Black door-to-door sales reps and mailmen have been labeled as “suspects”, according to the online company.

White members of Nextdoor have used the site to call the police and file complaints about Black residents nearby, which includes being “too noisy” at public parks and bars. Mitsu Fisher, a Black father of two, isn’t allowing his kids to play outside or roam the neighborhood free without his presence. The concern stems from a February 2014 incident in which a patrol officer working for a private security company chased down and shot a young Black teenage boy. To make matters worse, the private security company that  the race soldier worked for forbids their officers from carrying firearms. As a result of shooting the Black teen, the officer was rewarded by white members of Nextdoor.com and local neighborhood groups on Yahoo, with all of them collaborating to buy him a gift.

One Black Oakland native by the name of Leland Thompson has grown so weary of the rampant racism in theses local Internet groups that he has decided to stop wearing hoodies. After regularly browsing “Glenfriends”, a Yahoo group created by the Glenview (in Oakland) neighborhood residents, he has discovered that an overwhelming amount of the “suspicious activity” reports in the group described him. “Black man, five-ten, 160 pounds, bald,” Mr. Thompson says in reference to the typical descriptions given in the “Glenfriends” Yahoo group.

For more on this story, follow this link.

B. Clark