Officials said the gunman broadcast the attack live on Twitch, Amazon’s live streaming site that is popular with gamers.
Twitch said it took the channel offline within two minutes of the violence beginning. The channel’s page only said it was “currently unavailable due to a violation of Twitch’s Community Guidelines or Terms of Service.”
In a statement, a Twitch spokeswoman said the site has “a zero-tolerance policy against violence of any kind and works promptly to respond to all incidents. The user has been suspended from our service indefinitely and we are taking all appropriate measures, including checking accounts that rebroadcast this content.
Screenshots of the broadcast circulated online, including some that appeared to show the gunman holding a gun and standing over a body in the grocery store.
In a manifesto believed to have been posted to the 4chan forum by the shooter, he wrote that he would use a GoPro Hero 7 Black camera to “livestream the attack on Twitch”, which he chose so that “all people with could watch and record on the internet.” He noted that the shooting at a Jewish synagogue in Halle, Germany, was also livestreamed on Twitch in 2019.
Other social media posts showed a list of instructions the gunman had prepared for himself — a to-do list that included “continue writing manifest” and “test livestream function before the actual attack” — on the messaging platform Discord. Discord’s username matched the name of the Twitch channel.
Discord has taken steps in recent years to improve content moderation — especially after white supremacists used the site to plan the “Unite the Right” rally in Charlottesville, Virginia, in 2017. But it still relies heavily on user reports, especially private servers that are invite-only and less visible externally.
Discord said it was investigating the messages, posted on a private server, and working with law enforcement, but declined to comment further.
“We extend our deepest condolences to the victims and their families, and we will do everything we can to assist the police in their investigation,” the company said.
