Streaming platforms host pro-terror songs that glorify October 7

Despite attempts by moderators to remove content praising Hamas and terrorist activity, a report titled Time to stop the music by the Washington DC-based Foundation for the Defence of Democracies (FDD) claims that similar material continues to appear on platforms such as SoundCloud, which allows people to upload and share tracks and podcasts directly with listeners.

Basic searches on the site surfaced Hamas symbols and references, as well as references to ISIS and al-Qaeda.

The report details a sample of more than 550 unique songs shared across more than 100 playlists that violated SoundCloud’s content guidelines based on the above characteristics.

Of a sample of 30 songs whose audio content was analysed, all explicitly glorified violent terrorism; 22 explicitly referenced Hamas, while eight referenced other terrorist factions.

Researchers from FDD used SoundCloud’s “related songs” feature to further explore references, revealing a “plethora” of content related to Hamas.

The problem is not limited to SoundCloud, with hundreds of offensive songs found on other platforms featuring unfiltered imagery of guns, tanks, Hamas flags and terrorist group symbols.

The cover of a playlist on YouTube Music with a Hamas paraglider titled Al-Aqsa Flood 10/7 (Photo: FDD)[Missing Credit]

FDD researchers highlighted pro-terror content on Apple Music, Spotify, YouTube Music, Amazon Music, Tidal, Deezer and Pandora.

The cover of one playlist on YouTube shows a Hamas paraglider with the title “Al-Aqsa Flood 10/7”, a reference to the name Hamas gave to the October 7 massacre, in which more than 1,200 people were killed.

Another song, called Flood by Mohamed Askar, which researchers found was available on Amazon Music, Spotify, Apple Music, YouTube, Tidal and Deezer, also appears to praise the Hamas-led attack. 

An image accompanying a track called Hamas, streamed on Apple Music, showed a photograph of the paragliders used on October 7 and referred to Hamas bombings. Another image, used as the cover art for a Spotify playlist titled War Nasheed, depicted a Hamas fighter.

FDD found that pro-Hamas users of the streaming platforms have developed tactics to evade content moderation.

A screenshot from SoundCloud of a track praising October 7, which researchers also found on Spotify, Apple Music, Amazon Music, Tidal, YouTube Music, Deezer, and Pandora (Photo: FDD)[Missing Credit]

One of these tactics identified on SoundCloud involves the use of codewords to evade keyword searches, for example replacing the “H” in Hamas with a seven (“7amas”) to bypass keyword limitations.

Both experienced listeners and terrorism experts are familiar with these codes, but the content moderation algorithms appear not to be, the report states.

FDD has called on law enforcement agencies to investigate whether the creators, producers and distributors of terrorist content are also providing material support to global terror groups.

SoundCloud and Spotify are both said to have deleted offensive material highlighted by FDD.A spokesman for SoundCloud told The Telegraph: “SoundCloud strictly prohibits terrorist and violent extremist content. We use a combination of automated systems, audio matching, keyword detection, user reporting, specialist human review, and partnerships with external experts and cross-industry organisations to detect and remove violative material.

“We continuously update our systems as bad actors adapt their tactics. We take all reports of violative content seriously and review them swiftly. We remain committed to improving our enforcement, collaborating with industry and law enforcement where appropriate, and complying with applicable legal obligations.”

Deezer told the Telegraph it removed  hateful and illegal content flagged to it. A spokesman said: “As soon as it’s reported to us, we make an assessment and remove it if necessary.”

The JC has approached all of the streaming services mentioned.