Twitch confirms the Buffalo gunman livestreamed Saturday's attack on its platform, saying it took his channel down within two minutes of the violence starting
and they're not removing it because it 'doesn't violate their terms of service.' https://twitter.com/... Drew Harwell / @drewharwell : The Buffalo shooting video is circulating online. One copy has more than 2 million views. Someone linked to it 10 hours ago on Facebook; it now has 500 comments, 46,000 shares and is still online. The original Twitch stream had 22 viewers. The video is never going away. Mike Masnick / @mmasnick : So, it's quite likely that Twitch removing this channel violates Texas' new social media content moderation law, which is now in effect. Just to give you a sense of how messed up the law is. https://twitter.com/... @rmac18 : One version I tracked used a screenrecorder to capture the Twitch stream and then post to a video sharing site. The link to that site has then spread across Facebook and Twitter by dozens of accounts. On FB that link has generated 43k interactions, according to CrowdTangle. @hasanthehun : at first i thought twitch let the video ride, but their moderation was actually on point. this was a random acc that only went live once before to test how to go live, went live w 20+ people watching and twitch took it down in almost a minute. compare that to fb. https://twitter.com/... @quatoria : Very few “gaming culture” sites, discords, or reddits take any kind of a hard line stance against white supremacist ideals, memes, and talking points. Usually they are played off as “jokes” or people are “warned” and allowed to continuously reoffend. @kazweida : I guess this is the free speech Republicans want. Live-streaming mass murder and genocide. https://twitter.com/... Bruce Ray / @raycondones : Sending Prayers to Buffalo Twitch needs to shut down for the whole day shits lame as fuck Sheera Frenkel / @sheeraf : Let's note that the Buffalo mass shooter cites the March, 2019 shooting in Christchurch as inspiration, and has managed to make his own gruesome video go viral on social media largely because still, three years later, social media companies have not figured this out. (Thread). Ryan Mac / @rmac18 : From the new Texas law to Elon Musk's proposed “free speech” version of Twitter, it's worth wondering how an incident like the Buffalo shooting would play out in the future on major US-based social platforms. https://twitter.com/... @romeisnotokay : The fact that Twitch didn't immediately come out with a statement denouncing the events in Buffalo, especially since this isn't the first time a tragedy like this has happened LIVE on their platform, is unacceptable. This is yet another reminder that Twitch doesn't care about us. Chad Loder / @chadloder : The Buffalo shooter appears to have been openly planning this mass shooting for several months on Discord. Those of us who monitor white supremacist Discord and Telegram channels will not be surprised. There's a lot of this stuff on there. https://twitter.com/... Mike Dunford / @questauthority : Yes, provided Twitch is over the user count. https://twitter.com/... @shambamtymaam : So Twitch still hasn't said anything about.. ANYTHING?! https://twitter.com/... @secretgamergrrl : I legitimately can't recall the last time I poked my head into the official discord for a given game (or bit of game creation software) and didn't see a ton of nazi symbols in avatars/reaction images. Twitch's most popular emote is the face of a nazi who heavily attacked a friend https://twitter.com/... @anildash : This is the “free speech” they want. https://twitter.com/... @sewpheeyuh : facebook only cares about hits & capital — no regard for the people who are consistently scarred or desensitized from viewing these things on the regular. we're just commodities for them to exploit. https://twitter.com/... @eoinhiggins_ : Video is down now https://twitter.com/... @lucidfoxx : Losing my mind that people are mad at Twitch right now. The platform deserves a ton of criticism, but they snapped this account up incredibly quick. Do people want Twitch working with law enforcement to vet potential threats to be even access the site? Not sure how you stop this. https://twitter.com/... Charlie Warzel / @cwarzel : just eternally grim that parts of this kind of video footage can just end up embedded into platforms/ become grist for content the same way that anything else is decontextualized & sliced up/remixed etc. that it could be just another thing the algo serves up is deeply upsetting Charlie Warzel / @cwarzel : many people paying attention after christchurch figured that this viral, live-streamed white supremacist mass shootings would become part of the playbook and it is so upsetting that it keeps happening and that platforms don't have a way to keep it from spreading in different ways https://twitter.com/... @rmac18 : It's gone from a Twitch livestream that was reportedly up for less than 2 minutes, to a rapidly spreading hydra of versions of live recording videos. It's spreading through bad actors, morbid human curiosity, and the inability of platforms to keep up. @rmac18 : On Twitter the link was tweeted 123 times leading to 722 interactions, according to CrowdTangle. It continues to spread now. Twitter also allowed for the video to be uploaded directly to its platform. I've seen a version with a warning overlay. No response yet from Twitter PR. Ben Collins / @oneunderscore__ : New from me: I tried to write about the Buffalo suspect's manifesto responsibly and comprehensively here. The story has some details. In short, the manifesto is a rant from a 4chan addict, obsessed with “the Great Replacement,” CRT and white grievance. https://www.nbcnews.com/... Charles Adler / @charlesadler : Few journalists as committed as Ben Collins @oneunderscore__ to the study of disinformation and its connection to extremism. Yesterday's (May 14, 2022) massacre in Buffalo, the latest manifestation of White Supremacism. 4 Chan is an image board/hate site. https://twitter.com/... Kellen Browning / @kellen_browning : Twitch, the livestreaming platform, confirms that the shooter who killed 10 people at a New York grocery story today streamed the attack live on its site. Says it has taken the channel offline and is monitoring for people rebroadcasting it. More updates: https://www.nytimes.com/... Bobby Allyn / @bobbyallyn : New: Twitch spokesperson confirms the Buffalo shooter live-streamed the incident on the platform. Company says user has been suspended and that it is taking “all appropriate action” to prevent it from being rebroadcast. https://twitter.com/... Mike Masnick / @mmasnick : Just to drive this point home, in the run up to the law passing, an amendment was proposed making it clear that sites could still take down “domestic terrorist” content. And the Republicans rejected it. https://www.techdirt.com/... Patricia Hernandez / @xpatriciah : if the screenshots floating around are true, it is buck fucking wild that discord did not catch this ahead of time given the level of detail being shared in the plans (or that it didn't get foiled, somehow, period) https://twitter.com/... Nathan Grayson / @vahn16 : while it's not confirmed, it seems like the shooter posted plans on discord well ahead of today. twitch also did not catch the shooter until after the damage was done. clearly, something needs to change https://twitter.com/... @kotaku : Discord says it is investigating posts related to the mass shooting that occurred in Buffalo, New York on Saturday: https://kotaku.com/... https://twitter.com/... @bpdalerts : BREAKING: BPD on scene of a mass shooting at the Tops in the 1200 block of Jefferson Avenue. Police say multiple people have been struck by gunfire. The shooter is in custody. Motorists and residents are urged to avoid the area. @ghosted_sound : We have politicians who use kremlin, known far-right & Q-anon extremist rheteric. We see them in the media use it, make threats against the “opposition”, with little to no consequences. This is part, of what emboldens domestic terrorism. Hate speech. https://twitter.com/... Kellen Browning / @kellen_browning : Update: Twitch says it removed the video within 2 minutes of the violence starting. Meanwhile, Discord, where the shooter allegedly posted a to-do list and other messages, says it is working with law enforcement to investigate. https://www.nytimes.com/... Robert Evans / @iwriteok : A manifesto has been published on /pol, credibly claiming to be written by the guy who carried out this attack. It's a standard fascist “white genocide” rant, filled with 4channy in-jokes, ala the Christchurch shooter. Most obviously he gives Sam Hyde's picture as his own. https://twitter.com/... Bobby Allyn / @bobbyallyn : In a document circulating online that appears to be the shooter's manifesto, he wrote that he chose Twitch because it's free for anyone, even people without accounts, unlike FB, he writes, and he cited the 2019 Halle Synagogue Shooting, which was also broadcast on Twitch.
Context & Ripple Effects
Twitch had faced a similar failure mode after the Halle shooting livestream, when a small live audience was followed by thousands of views before removal. In Buffalo, the initial stream again reached relatively few people, but copies moved onto Facebook and Twitter after Twitch acted.
The incident also spans both pre-attack planning and downstream distribution: reported Discord discussions of plans to livestream an attack put scrutiny on private-community platforms as well as hosts and rebroadcasters.
First-order effects
- Twitch removed the shooter's channel within two minutes and began monitoring rebroadcasts, while Facebook and Twitter faced the immediate problem of copies already drawing substantial engagement.
- Discord is investigating related posts and working with law enforcement after reports that the shooter used a private server to discuss his plans.
Second-order effects
- Twitch's rapid takedown does not contain the material once copies reach other platforms, shifting operational pressure toward cross-platform detection and removal rather than moderation at the original host alone.
- The reported conflict between Twitch's removal and Texas's social-media law makes platforms' violence-response policies a direct legal exposure, as detailed in the Texas-law challenge to the takedown.
Third-order effects
- The planned New York inquiry into platforms used to stream, promote, or plan the attack broadens accountability from a single hosting decision to the full chain of planning, live transmission, and recirculation.
- If that approach persists, platform safety enforcement will be judged increasingly on coordinated distribution-layer response, even where the original service removes content quickly.
The trend: Violent livestream incidents are turning content moderation into a cross-platform distribution and liability problem, spanning private planning spaces, live hosts, and reposting networks.