When the federal government issued social distancing guidelines across the nation, many employees were forced to work from home. To maintain communication, many companies turned to video teleconferencing sites like Zoom for virtual meetings. However, these virtual meetings are being hacked by racists blurting out obscene slurs, CNN reports.
The FBI issued a warning to Zoom users of the recent influx of hackers taking over meetings and yelling racist remarks.
“As large numbers of people turn to video-teleconferencing (VTC) platforms to stay connected in the wake of the COVID-19 crisis, reports of VTC hijacking (also called “Zoom-bombing”) are emerging nationwide,” the agency said.
CNN reports that the FBI has received multiple reports of video conferencing harassment. A spokesperson for Zoom told CNN they appreciate the efforts to raise awareness and are working to determine how to “best prevent these kinds of attacks.”
“We are listening to our community of users to help us evolve our approach,” the spokesperson said.
Despite the FBI’s warning and Zoom’s attempt to crack down on “Zoom-bombing,” one Black woman said after hearing a hacker blurt out n***a she canceled a future meeting.
Tiara Moore, the founder of WOC Space, was hosting a meeting as a virtual safe space for professional women of color when the incident occurred, BuzzFeed News reports.
Moore said as she was waiting for a few women to join, the meeting became crowded with what seemed to be 100 people with outbursts of racial slurs.
“I immediately closed it down like, what just happened,” she said.
“I felt personally attacked,” Moore added. “I was super emotional. I cried and I was like, ‘It’s 2020, what the f**k!'”
Moore’s business was founded as a place for women to meet and socialize in a virtual safe space, but she was heartbroken after the incident.
“It’s so heartbreaking and, for me to be promoting this virtual safe space and to be attacked, it’s so devastating,” she said.
Moore isn’t the only Black person who has experienced having her virtual meeting hijacked by racists. BuzzFeed News reports that a professor at UCLA was called a n***a while teaching an astronomy class on Zoom.
“[The professor] gave them the space to ask their question and then was bombarded by someone repeatedly referring to him as the n-word,” student Jessica Jackson said.
Jackson recorded the incident as it unfolded during her virtual class.
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“Idk who the people are that did this during our lecture but you’re incredibly immature and unbelievably disrespectful,” Jackson tweeted.
Another online meeting hosted by the Heman Sweatt Center for Black Males, an organization geared toward assisting Black students at the University of Texas at Austin, was hijacked. Unidentified people began shouting racial slurs during the meeting.
BuzzFeed News reports that peers of students from various colleges and universities are suspected of hijacking the calls, however, white supremacist groups could be behind the intimidation and racist tactics.
*story by Blavity News