WF Thomas

As mentioned, I am currently exploring new work opportunities and would love to connect with teams working on violence prevention, online harms, threat intelligence, or adjacent research and program support roles.

I’m always happy to chat or answer questions about this work.

🎮 Roblox imagery appeared frequently, reflecting its role as a core entry point for these networks

This work was part of a broader focus on understanding how extremist and high-risk communities operate across platforms, blend into mainstream spaces, and use migration tactics to evade moderation.

➡️ Most of the accounts reviewed included instructions or contact details to move interactions off-platform, primarily to Discord and Telegram

🧩 Users shared off-platform contact info in bios, captions, and even text embedded in images or videos

A few key findings from the report:

🔍 We identified content linked to NVE actors and related subnetworks across multiple mainstream platforms, including Instagram, TikTok, YouTube, Pinterest, and Roblox

Jumping Off Platform Examining How The Com and Related Networks Spread Content on Mainstream Social Media Platforms and Direct Users to Off-Platform Spaces

🔗 Jumping Off Platform: How “The Com” Uses Mainstream Platforms to Funnel Users Elsewhere: graphika.com/reports/jump...

As I continue my job hunt, I want to highlight some of my previous work I'm proud of.

During my time with @graphika.com I led the research and authoring of this report.

How Hate Groups and Terrorists Use Gaming Platforms to Recruit Young Children

Earlier this week @pbaskar.bsky.social quoted me in this excellent piece about how extremists around the world use platforms like Roblox & Minecraft to recruit children. Please read & share—especially with parents of young children.

Gift link! ⤵️

I am now looking for my next opportunity in the field! Any leads or suggestions would be greatly appreciated.

I am based in the USA, fluent in German, and comfortable analyzing a wide variety of digital landscapes.

Hi. I'm an OSINT researcher with experience targeting violent extremism, influence operations, and financial market threats. Most recently, I worked at Graphika turning complex data into actionable intelligence for clients, and before that worked at Spotify removing online harms.

For the other thread of this kirkified Bella Rittenhouse image: Kyle as meme subject.

A few years back, @daveforan.bsky.social + @hariprasad.bsky.social and I wrote about Rittenhouse memes after he killed 3 people. You can read it on @terpolv.bsky.social:

www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1...

For the first thread of this kirkified Bella Rittenhouse image: kirkification.

Recently, @oloonik.bsky.social and I wrote about a niche within the trend of kirkification (rap albums), which we shared on the WXQT blog last week. You can read it here:
wxqt-radio.ghost.io/lil-kirk/

screenshot of tweet from kyle rittenhouse, now posting under the handle @rittenhouse2a. he writes "I'm back on social media, I'm back in the fight, and i'm here to stay. For a quick update, 6 months ago I made the best decision of my life and married my best friend. @BellRittenhouse, I couldn’t be happier. I love you beautiful. More big announcements coming soon..." two photos are in his post. at the left is the couple holding firearms, kyle in a blue suit with a tan handgun, bella in a white wedding dress holding a tan ar-15-style rifle with a vertical foregrip and optic. at the right is a photo of kyle holding bella with water in the background, either an inlet or estuary, the sun just set moments before.

a screenshot of a tweet from @givemebudlight, who has zoomed in on bella rittenhouse in the gun picture of the couple and faceswapped charlie kirk's smiling face over hers

Yesterday, Kyle Rittenhouse posted a couple of photos from his wedding this summer, one of which features him and his bride armed with a handgun and rifle (respectively). It took someone like 8 hours to kirkify Kyle's wife lmao.

Lex McMenamin smiles at someone off camera in front of blue backdrop

Lex McMenamin smiles at camera seated in front of blue backdrop

hello 29k followers, time for my periodic reintro to find lefty friends etc!

i'm the 1-person politics section at @teenvogue.com (feat. TV pics 😎) where I cover and edit coverage of youth organizing, abolition, LGBTQ rights + healthcare, student debt, climate, education, electoral politics + more 🫡

Decoherence Media is publishing the first article in our 3 part investigation of the leaked web server for Rope Culture, the in-house magazine of notorious Nazi forum Iron March. There are hundreds of new Nazi email addresses and comments for researchers and journalists to dig through.

Dead internet theory is one of my extreme pet peeves. It's a conspiracy theory. The tech isn't there. It doesn't make logical sense. It's another way to dehumanize whoever might be on the other side of an account you disagree with.

045: Rockin' Out for MAGA Clout | Posting Through It Get more from Posting Through It on Patreon

This week’s premium episode is out. Sign up for our Patreon to hear @michaelehayden.bsky.social and I talk Red Scare, read a a bad article about Nick Fuentes, and examine the MAGA-friendly music scene. Plus, the pod debuts its first song “Sorrow / Antifa Reprise”

www.patreon.com/posts/141119...

My new chapter “Save our children from Satanists”: Women, Motherhood, and Satanic Moral Panic” is now out in ‘Satanism and Feminism in Popular Culture’ edited by Dr Miranda Corcoran. SO excited to have been included in this amazing collection & can’t wait to read the other papers!!

IF SLACK DOESN'T COME BACK UP IN THE NEXT 15 MINUTES YOU ARE LEGALLY ALLOWED TO LEAVE WORK

How do I explain to my therapist that even though "locked in" isn't on the emotion wheel, it's the most accurate way to describe how I'm feeling

Bluesky y'all should listen to the new album from @friendsinreallife.bsky.social it's very good and put a big smile on my face

Walking is lowkey goated when the vibe is having spontaneous low stakes conversations with those around you and feeling a potent sense of community

ATLANTA -- The City of Atlanta Department of Law carried out a raid of the once-independent Office of Inspector General (OIG) this week following former-Inspector General Shannon Manigault’s resignation on Monday, according to multiple sources who spoke on condition of anonymity.

You continue to have the coolest job

ICE Prosecutor in Dallas Runs White Supremacist X Account The Observer has identified the operator of “GlomarResponder,” an overtly racist social media account, as ICE Assistant Chief Counsel James Rodden, based on an overwhelming number of biographical details matched through publicly available documents, other social media activity, and courtroom observation.

REVEALED: we identified the operator of an overtly racist X account, "GlomarResponder," as ICE Assistant Chief Counsel James Rodden, based on an overwhelming number of biographical details matched through publicly available documents, other social media activity, and courtroom observation.

Did you floss yet today???

Waterpik is also acceptable

DID YOU FLOSS YET TODAY

Every time I do Wahl-O-Mat (I've done it a couple times over the years) I get Tierschutzparty. Not sure what this says about me and I am not a German voter but I do find it interesting.

Spineless and Literal | Dan Collen | Substack Spineless and Literal is a newsletter about the intersection of violent extremism and culture by Dan Collen. It is written with the belief that hate should be recognized but never normalized. Click to...

I started a (free) Substack publication. For its first post, I got a scoop about a Canadian-American Nazi who claims he campaigned with Kash Patel coming out tomorrow. Sign up if you want to read that. As you were. open.substack.com/pub/spineles...

Madison and Nashville School Shooters Appear to Have Crossed Paths in Online Extremist Communities A month after a student opened fire at Abundant Life Christian School, another killed a classmate at Antioch High School. Both were active in an internet subculture that glorifies mass shooters and en...

An excellent piece from @phoebepetrovic.bsky.social explaining what can be said right now about the Nashville & Madison shooters' SAVF network interactions that me & @hereticmasked.bsky.social have been working on for months. @alexbnewhouse.bsky.social gives a great description of specific behaviors

Me and @hereticmasked.bsky.social have been tracking an international hybrid threat network which we're calling the Soyjak Attacker Video Fandom (SAVF.) 4 people w/in it have committed attacks or attempted to. This is part 1 in our series.

Many thanks to @maargentino.com for hosting our work.