Europol has successfully coordinated a major operation involving eight nations to identify and remove racist, xenophobic, and terrorist propaganda from various gaming and gaming-related platforms.
The Referral Action Day, which took place on November 13, 2025, saw collaboration between law enforcement agencies in Denmark, Finland, Germany, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, Portugal, Spain, and the United Kingdom.
The operation resulted in the referral of thousands of URLs hosting dangerous and illicit material.
The European Union Internet Referral Unit (EU IRU) led the operational action, targeting specific types of extremist content.
The sweep identified approximately 5,408 links related to jihadist propaganda, 1,070 links connected to violent right-wing extremism, and 105 links promoting racist and xenophobic ideologies.
This joint effort highlights the increasing complexity of policing the digital space, particularly within the gaming sector where content creation and dissemination processes are often layered across multiple platforms.
Investigators found that extremist actors are increasingly utilizing the “gamification” of violence to reach younger audiences.
Perpetrators have been observed re-enacting terrorist attacks or school shootings within 3D gameplay environments, editing the footage with extremist jargon and music, and then disseminating the videos on mainstream social media.
Furthermore, platforms designed for streaming gameplay or community discussions are being misused to recruit minors into violent groups or, in extreme cases, to livestream real-world attacks.
The content targeted during the operation was discovered across a wide spectrum of digital services, including live-streaming sites, video-on-demand hosts, and community hubs used for exchanging gaming tips.
Authorities noted that many accounts were difficult to detect immediately, often using coded references to infamous terrorists in usernames or profile pictures.
This initiative stems from ongoing investigations supported by Europol’s European Counter Terrorism Centre, which identified gaming platforms as emerging venues for radicalization.
The EU IRU is set to publish a Transparency Report detailing these activities and its broader efforts to implement regulations addressing the dissemination of terrorist content online in 2024.
