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4chan is an anonymous English-language imageboard website. Launched by Christopher "moot" Poole in October 2003, the site hosts boards dedicated to a wide variety of topics, from
video game A video game or computer game is an electronic game that involves interaction with a user interface or input device (such as a joystick, game controller, controller, computer keyboard, keyboard, or motion sensing device) to generate visual fe ...
s and
television Television (TV) is a telecommunication medium for transmitting moving images and sound. Additionally, the term can refer to a physical television set rather than the medium of transmission. Television is a mass medium for advertising, ...
to
literature Literature is any collection of Writing, written work, but it is also used more narrowly for writings specifically considered to be an art form, especially novels, Play (theatre), plays, and poetry, poems. It includes both print and Electroni ...
,
cooking Cooking, also known as cookery or professionally as the culinary arts, is the art, science and craft of using heat to make food more palatable, digestible, nutritious, or Food safety, safe. Cooking techniques and ingredients vary widely, from ...
,
weapons A weapon, arm, or armament is any implement or device that is used to deter, threaten, inflict physical damage, harm, or kill. Weapons are used to increase the efficacy and efficiency of activities such as hunting, crime (e.g., murder), law ...
,
music Music is the arrangement of sound to create some combination of Musical form, form, harmony, melody, rhythm, or otherwise Musical expression, expressive content. Music is generally agreed to be a cultural universal that is present in all hum ...
,
history History is the systematic study of the past, focusing primarily on the Human history, human past. As an academic discipline, it analyses and interprets evidence to construct narratives about what happened and explain why it happened. Some t ...
,
technology Technology is the application of Conceptual model, conceptual knowledge to achieve practical goals, especially in a reproducible way. The word ''technology'' can also mean the products resulting from such efforts, including both tangible too ...
,
anime is a Traditional animation, hand-drawn and computer animation, computer-generated animation originating from Japan. Outside Japan and in English, ''anime'' refers specifically to animation produced in Japan. However, , in Japan and in Ja ...
,
physical fitness Physical fitness is a state of health and well-being and, more specifically, the ability to perform aspects of Outline of sports, sports, occupations, and daily activities. Physical fitness is generally achieved through proper nutrition, modera ...
,
politics Politics () is the set of activities that are associated with decision-making, making decisions in social group, groups, or other forms of power (social and political), power relations among individuals, such as the distribution of Social sta ...
, and
sports Sport is a physical activity or game, often competitive and organized, that maintains or improves physical ability and skills. Sport may provide enjoyment to participants and entertainment to spectators. The number of participants in ...
, among others. Registration is not available, except for staff, and users typically post anonymously. , 4chan receives more than 22 million unique monthly visitors, of whom approximately half are from the United States. 4chan was created as an unofficial English-language counterpart to the Japanese imageboard Futaba Channel, also known as 2chan, and its first boards were originally used for posting images and discussion related to anime. The site has been described as a hub of Internet subculture, its community being influential in the formation and popularization of prominent
Internet meme An Internet meme, or meme (, Help:Pronunciation respelling key, ''MEEM''), is a cultural item (such as an idea, behavior, or style) that spreads across the Internet, primarily through Social media, social media platforms. Internet memes manif ...
s, such as
lolcat A lolcat (pronounced ), or LOLcat, is an image macro of one or more cats. Lolcat images' Idiosyncrasy, idiosyncratic and intentionally grammatically incorrect text is known as lolspeak. Lolcat is a Compound (linguistics), compound word of the ...
s, Rickrolling, rage comics,
wojak Wojak (from Polish language, Polish , loosely 'soldier' or 'fighter'), also known as Feels Guy, is an Internet meme that is, in its original form, a simple, black-outlined cartoon drawing of a bald man with a wistfulness, wistful expression. ...
s, Pepe the Frog, as well as
hacktivist Hacktivism (or hactivism; a portmanteau of '' hack'' and ''activism''), is the use of computer-based techniques such as hacking as a form of civil disobedience to promote a political agenda or social change. A form of Internet activism with roo ...
and
political movement A political movement is a collective attempt by a group of people to change government policy or social values. Political movements are usually in opposition to an element of the status quo, and are often associated with a certain ideology. Some t ...
s, such as
Anonymous Anonymous may refer to: * Anonymity, the state of an individual's identity, or personally identifiable information, being publicly unknown ** Anonymous work, a work of art or literature that has an unnamed or unknown creator or author * Anonym ...
and the
alt-right The alt-right (abbreviated from alternative right) is a Far-right politics, far-right, White nationalism, white nationalist movement. A largely Internet activism, online phenomenon, the alt-right originated in the United States during the late ...
. 4chan has often been the subject of media attention as a source of controversies, including the coordination of pranks and harassment against websites and Internet users, and the posting of illegal and offensive content as a result of its lax censorship and moderation policies. In 2008, ''
The Guardian ''The Guardian'' is a British daily newspaper. It was founded in Manchester in 1821 as ''The Manchester Guardian'' and changed its name in 1959, followed by a move to London. Along with its sister paper, ''The Guardian Weekly'', ''The Guardi ...
'' summarized the 4chan community as "lunatic, juvenile  ..brilliant, ridiculous and alarming".


Background

The majority of posting on 4chan takes place on imageboards, on which users have the ability to share images and create threaded discussions. , the site's homepage lists 75 imageboards and one
Flash animation Adobe Flash animation (formerly Macromedia Flash animation and FutureSplash animation) is an animation that is created with the Adobe Animate (formerly Flash Professional) platform or similar animation software and often distributed in the SW ...
board. Most boards have their own set of rules and are dedicated to a specific topic, including anime and manga, video games, music, literature, fitness, politics, and sports, among others. Uniquely, the "Random" board—also known as /b/—enforces few rules. 4chan is the Internet's most trafficked imageboard, according to the ''
Los Angeles Times The ''Los Angeles Times'' is an American Newspaper#Daily, daily newspaper that began publishing in Los Angeles, California, in 1881. Based in the Greater Los Angeles city of El Segundo, California, El Segundo since 2018, it is the List of new ...
''. 4chan's Alexa rank was 853 in March 2022, though it has been as high as 56. It is provided to its users free of charge and consumes a large amount of bandwidth; as a result, its financing has often been problematic. Poole has acknowledged that donations alone could not keep the site online, and turned to advertising to help make ends meet. However, the explicit content hosted on 4chan has deterred businesses who do not want to be associated with the site's content. In January 2009, Poole signed a new deal with an advertising company; in February 2009, he was $20,000 in debt, and the site was continuing to lose money. The 4chan servers were moved from Texas to California in August 2008, which upgraded the maximum bandwidth throughput of 4chan from 100 Mbit/s to 1 Gbit/s. Unlike most web forums, 4chan does not have a registration system, allowing users to post anonymously. Posting is
ephemeral Ephemerality (from the Greek word , meaning 'lasting only one day') is the concept of things being transitory, existing only briefly. Academically, the term ephemeral constitutionally describes a diverse assortment of things and experiences, fr ...
, as threads receiving recent replies are " bumped" to the top of their respective board and old threads are deleted as new ones are created. Any nickname may be used when posting, even one that has been previously adopted, such as "Anonymous" or "moot". In place of registration, 4chan has provided tripcodes as an optional form of authenticating a poster's identity. As making a post without filling in the "Name" field causes posts to be attributed to "Anonymous", general understanding on 4chan holds that Anonymous is not a single person but a collective (hive) of users. Moderators generally post without a name even when performing
sysop A sysop (, an abbreviation of system operator) is an administrator of a multi-user computer system, such as a bulletin board system (BBS) or an online service virtual community.Jansen, E. & James, V. (2002). NetLingo: the Internet dictionary. Ne ...
actions. A "capcode" may be used to attribute the post to "Anonymous ## Mod", although moderators often post without the capcode. In a 2011 interview on
Nico Nico Douga , known before 2012 as , is a Japanese video sharing service based in Tokyo, Japan. "Niconico" or "nikoniko" is the Japanese ideophone for smiling. As of 2021, Niconico is the 34th most-visited website in Japan, according to Alexa Internet. ...
, Poole explained that there are approximately 20 volunteer moderators active on 4chan. 4chan also has a junior moderation team, called "janitors", who may delete posts or images and suggest that the normal moderation team ban a user, but who cannot post with a capcode. Revealing oneself as a janitor is grounds for immediate dismissal. Gianluca Stringhini, an associate professor at Boston University College of Engineering, said in August 2024, "The only moderation on the platform appears to be for clearly illegal content, such as
child pornography Child pornography (also abbreviated as CP, also called child porn or kiddie porn, and child sexual abuse material, known by the acronym CSAM (underscoring that children can not be deemed willing participants under law)), is Eroticism, erotic ma ...
. Everything else remains untouched." 4chan has been the target of occasional denial of service attacks. For instance, on December 28, 2010, 4chan and other websites went down due to such an attack, following which Poole said on his blog, "We now join the ranks of MasterCard, Visa,
PayPal PayPal Holdings, Inc. is an American multinational financial technology company operating an online payments system in the majority of countries that support E-commerce payment system, online money transfers; it serves as an electronic alter ...
, et al. - an exclusive club!"


History


2000s

The site was launched as 4chan.net on October 1, 2003, by Christopher Poole, a then-15-year-old student from
New York City New York, often called New York City (NYC), is the most populous city in the United States, located at the southern tip of New York State on one of the world's largest natural harbors. The city comprises five boroughs, each coextensive w ...
using the online handle "moot". Poole had been a regular participant on
Something Awful ''Something Awful'' (SA) is an American comedy website hosting content including blog entries, Internet forum, forums, feature articles, digitally edited pictures, and humorous media reviews. It was created by Richard Kyanka, Richard "Lowtax" K ...
's subforum "Anime Death Tentacle Rape Whorehouse" (ADTRW), where many users were familiar with the Japanese imageboard format and Futaba Channel ("2chan.net"). When creating 4chan, Poole obtained Futaba Channel's open
source code In computing, source code, or simply code or source, is a plain text computer program written in a programming language. A programmer writes the human readable source code to control the behavior of a computer. Since a computer, at base, only ...
and translated the Japanese text into English using
AltaVista AltaVista was a web search engine established in 1995. It became one of the most-used early search engines, but lost ground to Google and was purchased by Yahoo! in 2003, which retained the brand, but based all AltaVista searches on its own sear ...
's Babel Fish online translator. After the site's creation, Poole invited users from the ADTRW subforum, many of whom were dissatisfied with the site's moderation, to visit 4chan, which he advertised as an English-language counterpart to Futaba Channel and a place for Western fans to discuss anime and manga. At its founding, the site only hosted one board: /b/ (Anime/Random). Before the end of 2003, several new anime-related boards were added, including /h/ (
Hentai Hentai () is a style of Pornography in Japan, Japanese pornographic anime and manga. In addition to anime and manga, hentai works exist in a variety of media, including artwork and video games (commonly known as ''eroge''). The developme ...
), /c/ ( Anime/Cute), /d/ (Hentai/Alternative), /w/ (Wallpapers/Anime), /y/ (
Yaoi , also known by its abbreviation , is a genre of fictional media originating in Japan that depicts homoerotic relationships between male characters. It is typically created by women for a female audience, distinguishing it from the equivale ...
), and /a/ (Anime). In the early days of the website, Poole hosted meetings from 2005 to 2008 in various locations to promote it, such as
Otakon Otakon ( ) is an annual three-day anime convention held during July/August. From 1999 to 2016, it took place at the Baltimore Convention Center in Baltimore, Baltimore, Maryland's Inner Harbor district; in 2017, it moved to the Walter E. Washing ...
, that popularized some of the first 4chan-related memes. Additionally, a
lolicon In Japanese popular culture, is a genre of fictional media which focuses on young or young-looking girl characters, particularly in a sexually suggestive or erotic manner. The term, a portmanteau of the English-language phrase " Lolita co ...
board was created at /l/ (Lolikon), but was disabled following the posting of real-life
child pornography Child pornography (also abbreviated as CP, also called child porn or kiddie porn, and child sexual abuse material, known by the acronym CSAM (underscoring that children can not be deemed willing participants under law)), is Eroticism, erotic ma ...
and ultimately deleted in October 2004, after threats of legal action. In February 2004,
GoDaddy GoDaddy Inc. is an American publicly traded Internet Domain name registry, domain registry, Domain name registrar, domain registrar and web hosting company headquartered in Tempe, Arizona, and incorporated in Delaware. GoDaddy is the world's fif ...
suspended the 4chan.net domain, prompting Poole to move the site to its current domain at 4chan.org. On March 1, 2004, Poole announced that he lacked the funds to pay the month's server bill, but was able to continue operations after receiving a swarm of donations from users. In June 2004, 4chan experienced six weeks of downtime due to PayPal suspending 4chan's donations service after receiving complaints about the site's content. Following 4chan's return, several non-anime related boards were introduced, including /k/ (Weapons), /o/ ( Auto), and /v/ (
Video Games A video game or computer game is an electronic game that involves interaction with a user interface or input device (such as a joystick, game controller, controller, computer keyboard, keyboard, or motion sensing device) to generate visual fe ...
). In 2008, nine new boards were created, including the sports board at /sp/, the fashion board at /fa/ and the "Japan/General" (the name later changed to "
Otaku is a Japanese word that describes people with consuming interests, such as anime, manga, video games, computers or other highly enthusiastic hobbies. Its contemporary use originated with a 1983 essay by Akio Nakamori in '' Manga Burikko''. ...
Culture") board at /jp/. By this point, 4chan's culture had altered, moving away from the "early, more childish," humour, as evident by the likes of
Project Chanology Project Chanology (also called Operation Chanology) was a protest movement against the practices of the Church of Scientology by members of Anonymous (group), Anonymous, a leaderless Internet-based group. "Chanology" is a portmanteau of "4chan" ...
; trolling underwent a so-called "golden age" that took aim at American corporate media.


2010s

In January 2011, Poole announced the deletion of the /r9k/ ("ROBOT9000") and /new/ (News) boards, saying that /new/ had become devoted to racist discussions, and /r9k/ no longer served its original purpose of being a test implementation of
xkcd ''xkcd'' is a serial webcomic created in 2005 by American author Randall Munroe. Sometimes styled ''XKCD'', the comic's tagline describes it as "a webcomic of romance, sarcasm, math, and language". Munroe states on the comic's website that the ...
's ROBOT9000 script. During the same year, the /soc/ board was created in an effort to reduce the number of socialization threads on /b/. /r9k/ was restored on October 23, 2011, along with /hc/ ("Hardcore", previously deleted), /pol/ (a rebranding of /new/) and the new /diy/ board, in addition to an apology by Poole where he recalls how he criticized the deletion of Encyclopedia Dramatica and realized that he had done the same. In 2010, 4chan had implemented
reCAPTCHA reCAPTCHA Inc. is a CAPTCHA system owned by Google. It enables web hosts to distinguish between human and automated access to websites. The original version asked users to decipher hard-to-read text or match images. Version 2 also asked users ...
in an effort to thwart spam arising from
JavaScript JavaScript (), often abbreviated as JS, is a programming language and core technology of the World Wide Web, alongside HTML and CSS. Ninety-nine percent of websites use JavaScript on the client side for webpage behavior. Web browsers have ...
worms. By November 2011, 4chan made the transition to utilizing
Cloudflare Cloudflare, Inc., is an American company that provides content delivery network services, cybersecurity, DDoS mitigation, wide area network services, reverse proxies, Domain Name Service, ICANN-accredited domain registration, and other se ...
following a series of
DDoS In computing, a denial-of-service attack (DoS attack) is a cyberattack in which the perpetrator seeks to make a machine or network resource unavailable to its intended users by temporarily or indefinitely disrupting services of a host co ...
attacks. The 4chan imageboards were rewritten in valid
HTML5 HTML5 (Hypertext Markup Language 5) is a markup language used for structuring and presenting hypertext documents on the World Wide Web. It was the fifth and final major HTML version that is now a retired World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) recommend ...
/ CSS3 in May 2012 in an effort to improve client-side performance. On September 28, 2012, 4chan introduced a "4chan pass" that, when purchased, "allows users to bypass typing a reCAPTCHA verification when posting and reporting posts on the 4chan image boards"; the money raised from the passes to go towards supporting the site. On January 21, 2015, Poole stepped down as the site's administrator, citing stress from controversies such as
Gamergate Gamergate or GamerGate (GG) was a loosely organized online misogyny, misogynistic online harassment campaign motivated by a right-wing backlash against feminism, diversity, and progressivism in video game culture. It was conducted using the ...
as the reason for his departure. On September 21, 2015, Poole announced that
Hiroyuki Nishimura is a Japanese internet entrepreneur. He founded the message board 2channel, and is an administrator of 4chan. He is also a self-help author and TV personality. He is often known by his given name, , which he uses, rendered intentionally in low ...
had purchased from him the ownership rights to 4chan, without disclosing the terms of the acquisition. Nishimura was the former administrator of
2channel , also known as 2ch, Channel 2, and sometimes retrospectively as 2ch.net, was an anonymous Japanese textboard founded in 1999 by Hiroyuki Nishimura. Described in 2007 as "Japan's most popular online community", the site had a level of influe ...
between 1999 and 2014, the website forming the basis for anonymous posting culture which influenced later websites such as Futaba Channel and 4chan; Nishimura lost 2channel's domain after it was seized by his registrar, Jim Watkins due the latter's alleged financial difficulties. ''
Wired Wired may refer to: Arts, entertainment, and media Music * ''Wired'' (Jeff Beck album), 1976 * ''Wired'' (Hugh Cornwell album), 1993 * ''Wired'' (Mallory Knox album), 2017 * "Wired", a song by Prism from their album '' Beat Street'' * "Wired ...
'' later reported that Japanese toy manufacturer Good Smile Company, Japanese telecommunication Dwango, and Nishimura's company Future Search Brazil may have helped facilitate Nishimura's purchase, with anonymous sources telling the publication that Good Smile obtained partial ownership in the website as compensation. In October 2016, it was reported that the site was facing financial difficulties that could lead to its closure or radical changes. In a post titled "Winter is Coming", Hiroyuki Nishimura explained, "We had tried to keep 4chan as is. But I failed. I am sincerely sorry", citing server costs, infrastructure costs, and network fees. On November 17, 2018, it was announced that the site would be split into two, with the work-safe boards moved to a new domain, 4channel.org, while the NSFW boards would remain on the 4chan.org domain. In a series of posts on the topic, Nishimura explained that the split was due to 4chan being blacklisted by most advertising companies and that the new 4channel domain would allow for the site to receive advertisements by mainstream ad providers. All boards returned to the 4chan.org domain in December 2023 for unknown reasons, and 4channel.org now redirects to 4chan.org.


2020s

In a 2020 interview with Vice Media, several current or past moderators spoke about what they perceived as racist intent behind the site's management. They alleged that a managing moderator, known online as RapeApe, was attempting to use the site as a recruitment tool for the alt-right, and that Nishimura was "hands-off, leaving moderation of the site primarily to RapeApe." Neither Nishimura nor RapeApe responded to these allegations. Far-right extremism has been reported by public authorities, commentators and civil society groups as connected, in part, to 4chan, an association that had arisen by 2015. According to 4chan's filings to the New York Attorney General's Office, 4chan signed an agreement to pay RapeApe $3,000 a month for their services in 2015. By May 2022, that fee had risen to $4,400 a month. The submitted documents also revealed RapeApe lamenting that 4chan was "getting the shaft" over the Buffalo terrorist attack and his attempt to persuade the advertising platform Bid.Glass to reverse their exit from the website. On April 14, 2025, 4chan was hacked by an anonymous user who later announced the hack on soyjak.party, a rival imageboard website with origins related to 4chan. Source code and user logins of those who registered with emails were apparently acquired by the user and leaked online. Additionally, the deleted /qa/ board was restored. On soyjak.party, information purporting to be from the hack was released, claiming "admin" level access, a lack of updates to the site since 2016, and identities of admins, among other claims. One of the last known posts made on 4chan before it was taken down was the " Chicken jockey!" quote, taken from '' A Minecraft Movie''. In the days following the attacks, 4chan and Nishimura's official Twitter accounts released statements confirming that they would work to fix security vulnerabilities and return at a later date. The site returned on April 25. Due to its temporary unavailability, some users took to the site's Downdetector page, using its comment section as a temporary replacement for the website.


Christopher Poole

Poole concealed his real-life identity until it was revealed on July 9, 2008, in ''
The Wall Street Journal ''The Wall Street Journal'' (''WSJ''), also referred to simply as the ''Journal,'' is an American newspaper based in New York City. The newspaper provides extensive coverage of news, especially business and finance. It operates on a subscriptio ...
''. Prior to that, he had used the alias "moot". In April 2009, an open Internet poll conducted by ''Time'' magazine voted Poole as the world's most influential person of 2008. The results were questioned even before the poll completed, as automated voting programs and manual ballot stuffing were used to influence the vote. 4chan's interference with the vote seemed increasingly likely, when it was found that reading the first letter of the first 21 candidates in the poll spelled out a phrase containing two 4chan memes: "mARBLECAKE. ALSO, THE GAME." On September 12, 2009, Poole gave a talk regarding 4chan's reputation as a "Meme Factory" at the Paraflows Symposium in
Vienna, Austria Vienna ( ; ; ) is the capital city, capital, List of largest cities in Austria, most populous city, and one of Federal states of Austria, nine federal states of Austria. It is Austria's primate city, with just over two million inhabitants. ...
, which was part of the Paraflows 09 festival, themed Urban Hacking. In this talk, Poole mainly attributed this both to the anonymous system and to the lack of data retention on the site ("The site has no memory."). In April 2010, Poole testified in the trial '' United States of America v. David Kernell'' as a government witness, explaining the terminology used on 4chan to the prosecutor, ranging from "OP" to " lurker", as well as the nature of the data given to the
FBI The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) is the domestic Intelligence agency, intelligence and Security agency, security service of the United States and Federal law enforcement in the United States, its principal federal law enforcement ag ...
as part of the search warrant, including how users can be uniquely identified from site audit logs.


Notable boards


/b/

The "random" board, /b/, follows the design of Futaba Channel's Nijiura ("Random") board. It was the first board created, and has been described as 4chan's most popular board, accounting for 30% of site traffic in 2009. Gawker's Nick Douglas summarized /b/ as a board where "people try to shock, entertain, and coax free porn from each other." /b/ has a "no rules" policy, except for bans on certain illegal content, such as
child pornography Child pornography (also abbreviated as CP, also called child porn or kiddie porn, and child sexual abuse material, known by the acronym CSAM (underscoring that children can not be deemed willing participants under law)), is Eroticism, erotic ma ...
, invasions of other websites (posting floods of disruptive content), and under-18 viewing, all of which are inherited from site-wide rules. The "no invasions" rule was added in late 2006, after /b/ users spent most of that summer "invading" ''Habbo Hotel''. The "no rules" policy also applies to actions of administrators and moderators, which means that users may be banned at any time, for any reason, including for no reason at all. Due partially to its anonymous nature, board moderation is not always successful—indeed, the site's anti-child pornography rule is a subject of jokes on /b/. Christopher Poole told ''
The New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''NYT'') is an American daily newspaper based in New York City. ''The New York Times'' covers domestic, national, and international news, and publishes opinion pieces, investigative reports, and reviews. As one of ...
'', in a discussion on the moderation of /b/, that "the power lies in the community to dictate its own standards" and that site staff simply provided a framework. The humor of /b/'s many users, who refer to themselves as "/b/tards", is often incomprehensible to newcomers and outsiders, and is characterized by intricate inside jokes and
dark comedy Black comedy, also known as black humor, bleak comedy, dark comedy, dark humor, gallows humor or morbid humor, is a style of comedy that makes light of subject matter that is generally considered taboo, particularly subjects that are normally ...
. Users often refer to each other, and much of the outside world, as fags. They are often referred to by outsiders as
trolls A troll is a being in Nordic folklore, including Norse mythology. In Old Norse sources, beings described as trolls dwell in isolated areas of rocks, mountains, or caves, live together in small family units, and are rarely helpful to human be ...
, who regularly act with the intention of "doing it for the lulz", a
corruption Corruption is a form of dishonesty or a criminal offense that is undertaken by a person or an organization that is entrusted in a position of authority to acquire illicit benefits or abuse power for one's gain. Corruption may involve activities ...
of " LOL" used to denote amusement at another's expense. A significant amount of media coverage is in response to /b/'s culture, which has been characterized as adolescent, crude and spiteful, with one publication writing that their "bad behavior is encouraged by the site's total anonymity and the absence of an archive". Douglas cited Encyclopedia Dramatica's definition of /b/ as "the asshole of the Internets 'sic''. Mattathias Schwartz of ''The New York Times'' likened /b/ to "a high-school bathroom stall, or an obscene telephone party line", while '' Baltimore City Paper'' wrote that "in the high school of the Internet, /b/ is the kid with a collection of butterfly knives and a locker full of porn." ''
Wired Wired may refer to: Arts, entertainment, and media Music * ''Wired'' (Jeff Beck album), 1976 * ''Wired'' (Hugh Cornwell album), 1993 * ''Wired'' (Mallory Knox album), 2017 * "Wired", a song by Prism from their album '' Beat Street'' * "Wired ...
'' describes /b/ as "notorious". Each post is assigned a post number. Certain post numbers are sought after with a large amount of posting taking place to "GET" them. A "GET" occurs when a post's number ends in a special number, such as 12345678, 22222222, or every millionth post. A sign of 4chan's scaling, according to Poole, was when GETs lost meaning due to the high post rate resulting in a GET occurring every few weeks. He estimated /b/'s post rate in July 2008 to be 150,000–200,000 posts per day.


/mlp/

The ''
My Little Pony ''My Little Pony'' (''MLP'') is a toy line and media franchise developed by American toy company Hasbro. The first toys were developed by Bonnie Zacherle, Charles Muenchinger, and Steve D'Aguanno, and were produced in 1981. The ponies feature ...
'' board, /mlp/, titled as ''Pony'', is dedicated to discussion of the animated television series '' My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic'' and its associated fandom. Created on February 16, 2012, the board was established by Poole in response to the growing popularity of pony-related content flooding other boards, particularly /co/ and /b/. Along with the board's creation, Poole implemented "Global Rule 15" (GR15), which banned pony content outside of a few select boards, directing all such discussions to /mlp/. The board became home to the "brony" fandom on 4chan, though many users on /mlp/ reject this label, preferring self-deprecating terms like ''horsefuckers'' or ''ponyfags''. Notable events include a 2013 Q&A with ''Friendship Is Magic'' creator
Lauren Faust Lauren J. Faust (born July 25, 1974) is an American animator, writer, director, and producer. She is known for developing the animated series '' My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic'' and '' DC Super Hero Girls''. Faust has collaborated with her ...
and the board's temporary merger with /pol/ on April 1, 2017, creating "/mlpol/". Despite the original series ending in 2019, /mlp/ continues to maintain an active community. The board has been the subject of academic research regarding
masculinity Masculinity (also called manhood or manliness) is a set of attributes, behaviors, and roles generally associated with men and boys. Masculinity can be theoretically understood as Social construction of gender, socially constructed, and there i ...
and
online identity Internet identity (IID), also online identity, online personality, online persona or internet persona, is a social identity that an Internet user establishes in online communities and websites. It may also be an actively constructed presentatio ...
, particularly in a 2017 ethnographic study published in the journal '' Sexualities'' that examined how users construct collective identity around their interest in the show and its characters.


/mu/

The music board, /mu/, is dedicated to the discussion of music artists, albums, genres, and instruments. Described as "4chan's best kept secret" and a "surprisingly artistic side of 4chan", /mu/ is used by users to share their music interests with similar minds and discover "great music they would never have found otherwise" with many moments of insightful candor that can affirm or challenge their own musical tastes. The board has gained notoriety for earnestly focusing upon and promoting challenging and otherwise obscure music. Some common genres discussed on /mu/ include
shoegaze Shoegaze (originally called shoegazing and sometimes conflated with dream pop) is a subgenre of indie rock, indie and alternative rock characterized by its ethereal mixture of obscured vocals, guitar distortion (music), distortion and effects, a ...
,
experimental hip hop Alternative hip-hop (also known as alternative rap and experimental hip-hop) is a subgenre of hip-hop music that encompasses a wide range of styles that are not typically identified as mainstream. AllMusic defines it as comprising "hip-hop group ...
, witch house, IDM, midwest emo,
vaporwave Vaporwave is a microgenre of electronic music, a visual art style, and an Internet meme that emerged in the early 2010s and became well-known in 2015. It is defined partly by its slowed-down, chopped and screwed samples of smooth jazz, 1970 ...
, and
K-pop K-pop (; an abbreviation of "Korean popular music") is a form of popular music originating in South Korea. It emerged in the 1990s as a form of youth subculture, with Korean musicians taking influence from Western Electronic dance music, danc ...
. There is a significant overlap between user bases of /mu/ and music site
Rate Your Music Rate Your Music (often abbreviated to RYM) is an online encyclopedia of music releases and films. Users can catalog items from their personal collection, review them, and assign ratings in a five-star rating system. The site also features comm ...
. The board's culture has inspired many online music communities and
meme A meme (; ) is an idea, behavior, or style that Mimesis, spreads by means of imitation from person to person within a culture and often carries symbolic meaning representing a particular phenomenon or theme. A meme acts as a unit for carrying c ...
pages on social media that emulate /mu/'s posting style. Publications such as ''
Pitchfork A pitchfork or hay fork is an agricultural tool used to pitch loose material, such as hay, straw, manure, or leaves. It has a long handle and usually two to five thin tines designed to efficiently move such materials. The term is also applie ...
'' and ''
Entertainment Weekly ''Entertainment Weekly'' (sometimes abbreviated as ''EW'') is an American online magazine, digital-only entertainment magazine based in New York City, published by Dotdash Meredith, that covers film, television, music, Broadway theatre, books, ...
'' noted the board played a significant role in popularizing various music artists, such as Death Grips,
Neutral Milk Hotel Neutral Milk Hotel was an American band formed by Jeff Mangum in Ruston, Louisiana, in 1989. They were active until 1998, and then from 2013 to 2015. The band's music featured a deliberately low-quality sound, influenced by indie rock and psy ...
,
Car Seat Headrest Car Seat Headrest is an American indie rock band formed in Leesburg, Virginia, and currently located in Seattle, Seattle, Washington. The band consists of Will Toledo (vocals, guitar, piano, synthesizers), Ethan Ives (guitar, bass, backing voca ...
, and Have a Nice Life. Prominent music critic
Anthony Fantano Anthony Nicholas Fantano ( ; born October 28, 1985) is an American Music journalism, music critic and internet personality who runs ''The Needle Drop'', a YouTube channel with a tie-in website and Twitch (service), Twitch streaming channel. Self ...
began his career on /mu/ and developed a significant following there. Some artists, like Zeal & Ardor and Conrad Tao, admitted to posting their music anonymously on /mu/ to get honest feedback, as well as find inspiration from the board. In particular, Zeal & Ardor said their sound, which mixes
black metal Black metal is an extreme metal, extreme subgenre of heavy metal music. Common traits include Tempo#Beats per minute, fast tempos, a Screaming (music)#Black metal, shrieking vocal style, heavily distorted Electric guitar, guitars played with tr ...
with
spirituals Spirituals (also known as Negro spirituals, African American spirituals, Black spirituals, or spiritual music) is a genre of Christian music that is associated with African Americans, which merged varied African cultural influences with the exp ...
, came from suggestions by two users. Andrew W.K. did a Q&A with the board's users in 2011, causing the servers to crash from the increased traffic. Death Grips seeded various clues on /mu/ in 2012 about their then-upcoming albums ''The Money Store'' and '' No Love Deep Web''. A rendition of " Royals" by
Lorde Ella Marija Lani Yelich-O'Connor (born 7 November 1996), known professionally as Lorde ( ), is a New Zealand singer and songwriter. She is known for her unconventional style of pop music and introspective songwriting, and has been referred to ...
appeared on /mu/ in 2012 before its official release, although she denied ever writing on the board in 2014. Singer Lauren Mayberry shared on
Twitter Twitter, officially known as X since 2023, is an American microblogging and social networking service. It is one of the world's largest social media platforms and one of the most-visited websites. Users can share short text messages, image ...
in 2015 a link to a thread on /mu/ about her band's song " Leave a Trace" to showcase what online misogyny looks like. An alleged unreleased
Radiohead Radiohead are an English rock band formed in Abingdon-on-Thames, Abingdon, Oxfordshire, in 1985. The band members are Thom Yorke (vocals, guitar, piano, keyboards); brothers Jonny Greenwood (guitar, keyboards, other instruments) and Colin Gre ...
song, titled "Putting Ketchup in the Fridge" and "How Do You Sit Still", was initially reported as genuine by ''
NME ''New Musical Express'' (''NME'') is a British music, film, gaming and culture website, bimonthly magazine, and brand. Founded as a newspaper in 1952, with the publication being referred to as a "Rock music, rock inkie", the ''NME'' would be ...
'' and '' Spin'' until
CNN Cable News Network (CNN) is a multinational news organization operating, most notably, a website and a TV channel headquartered in Atlanta. Founded in 1980 by American media proprietor Ted Turner and Reese Schonfeld as a 24-hour cable ne ...
revealed it was a hoax promoted by the board's users. The board has been acknowledged for sharing rare music recordings and unreleased materials, as well as finding albums thought to be lost. Notable examples include the works of Duster, ''D>E>A>T>H>M>E>T>A>L'' by Panchiko, and '' All Lights Fucked on the Hairy Amp Drooling'' by
Godspeed You! Black Emperor Godspeed You! Black Emperor (sometimes abbreviated to GY!BE or Godspeed) is a Canadian post-rock collective that originated in Montreal, Quebec in 1994. The group releases recordings through Constellation Records (Canada), Constellation, an in ...
. This was described by NPR as resembling "a secret club of preservationists obsessed with the articulation of a near-dead language". The board has attracted further attention for various projects done by its users. A group called The Pablo Collective posted a 4-track remix album of
Kanye West Ye ( ; born Kanye Omari West ; June 8, 1977) is an American rapper, singer and record producer. One of the most prominent figures in hip-hop, he is known for his varying musical style and polarizing cultural and political commentary. After ...
's ''
The Life of Pablo ''The Life of Pablo'' is the seventh studio album by American rapper Kanye West. It was released on February 14, 2016, through GOOD Music and distributed by Def Jam Recordings. Recording sessions took place from 2013 to 2016, in Italy, Mexico, ...
'' titled ''The Death of Pablo'' to /mu/, claiming it was based on a recurring dream from one of the board's users. A
role-playing game A role-playing game (sometimes spelled roleplaying game, or abbreviated as RPG) is a game in which players assume the roles of player character, characters in a fictional Setting (narrative), setting. Players take responsibility for acting out ...
based on Neutral Milk Hotel's '' In the Aeroplane Over the Sea'', designed with help from the board's users, received coverage from ''
Polygon In geometry, a polygon () is a plane figure made up of line segments connected to form a closed polygonal chain. The segments of a closed polygonal chain are called its '' edges'' or ''sides''. The points where two edges meet are the polygon ...
'' and ''Pitchfork''.


/pol/

/pol/ ("
Politically Incorrect "Political correctness" (adjectivally "politically correct"; commonly abbreviated to P.C.) is a term used to describe language, policies, or measures that are intended to avoid offense or disadvantage to members of particular groups in society. ...
") is 4chan's political discussion board. A stickied thread on its front page states that the board's intended purpose is "discussion of news, world events, political issues, and other related topics." /pol/ was created in October 2011 as a rebranding of 4chan's
news News is information about current events. This may be provided through many different Media (communication), media: word of mouth, printing, Mail, postal systems, broadcasting, Telecommunications, electronic communication, or through the te ...
board, /new/, which was deleted that January for a high volume of racist discussion. Although there had previously been a strong left-libertarian contingent to 4chan activists, there was a gradual rightward turn on 4chan's politics board in the early-mid 2010s, with the fundamentalist approach to free speech contributing. The board quickly attracted posters with a political persuasion that later would be described with a new term, the
alt-right The alt-right (abbreviated from alternative right) is a Far-right politics, far-right, White nationalism, white nationalist movement. A largely Internet activism, online phenomenon, the alt-right originated in the United States during the late ...
. Media sources have characterized /pol/ as predominantly
racist Racism is the belief that groups of humans possess different behavioral traits corresponding to inherited attributes and can be divided based on the superiority of one Race (human categorization), race or ethnicity over another. It may also me ...
and
sexist Sexism is prejudice or discrimination based on one's sex or gender. Sexism can affect anyone, but primarily affects women and girls. It has been linked to gender roles and stereotypes, and may include the belief that one sex or gender is int ...
, with many of its posts taking an explicitly
neo-Nazi Neo-Nazism comprises the post–World War II militant, social, and political movements that seek to revive and reinstate Nazism, Nazi ideology. Neo-Nazis employ their ideology to promote hatred and Supremacism#Racial, racial supremacy (ofte ...
bent. The site's far-reaching culture of vitriolic and discriminatory content is "most closely associated" with /pol/, although only it features predominant Alt-Right beliefs; /pol/, like other boards, has been prominent in the dissemination of memes, in cases, featuring coordination to disperse Alt-Right sentiments. /pol/ "increasingly became synonymous with 4chan as a whole". The
Southern Poverty Law Center The Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC) is an American 501(c)(3) nonprofit legal advocacy organization specializing in civil rights and public interest litigation. Based in Montgomery, Alabama, it is known for its legal cases against white ...
regards /pol/'s rhetorical style as widely emulated by
white supremacist White supremacy is the belief that white people are superior to those of other races. The belief favors the maintenance and defense of any power and privilege held by white people. White supremacy has roots in the now-discredited doctrine ...
websites such as ''
The Daily Stormer ''The Daily Stormer'' is an American neo-Nazi commentary and message board website that advocates for a Second Holocaust, second genocide of Jews. It is part of the alt-right movement. Its editor, Andrew Anglin, founded the outlet on July 4, ...
''; the ''Stormer''s editor, Andrew Anglin, concurred. /pol/ was where screenshots of Trayvon Martin's hacked social media accounts were initially posted. The board's users have started
antifeminist Antifeminism or anti-feminism is opposition to feminism. In the late 19th century and early 20th century, antifeminists opposed particular policy proposals for women's rights, such as women's suffrage, the right to vote, Female education, educat ...
,
homophobic Homophobia encompasses a range of negative attitudes and feelings toward homosexuality or people who identify or are perceived as being lesbian, Gay men, gay or bisexual. It has been defined as contempt, prejudice, aversion, hatred, or ant ...
, transphobic, and anti-Arab
Twitter Twitter, officially known as X since 2023, is an American microblogging and social networking service. It is one of the world's largest social media platforms and one of the most-visited websites. Users can share short text messages, image ...
campaigns. Many /pol/ users favored
Donald Trump Donald John Trump (born June 14, 1946) is an American politician, media personality, and businessman who is the 47th president of the United States. A member of the Republican Party (United States), Republican Party, he served as the 45 ...
during his 2016 United States presidential campaign. Both Trump and his son, Donald Trump Jr., appeared to acknowledge the support by tweeting /pol/-associated memes. Upon his successful election, a /pol/ moderator embedded a pro-Trump video at the top of all of the board's pages.


/r9k/

/r9k/ is a board that implements
Randall Munroe Randall Patrick Munroe (born October 17, 1984) is an American cartoonist, author, and engineer best known as the creator of the webcomic ''xkcd''. Munroe has worked full-time on the comic since late 2006. In addition to publishing a book of the ...
's " ROBOT9000" algorithm, where no exact reposts are permitted."Welcome to /r9k/
/r9k/ is an imageboard where there are no exact reposts." (archive) (2015-10-24) ccessed 20-07-18/ref> It is credited as the origin of the "greentext" rhetorical style which often center around stories of social interactions and resulting ineptness.Agustin IV, Morado (2016). ''From readerly to writerly (and back again): a rhetorical analysis of greentext stories''. Northern Illinois University. By 2012, personal confession stories of self-loathing, depression, and attempted suicide began to supersede /b/-style roleplaying, ''
otaku is a Japanese word that describes people with consuming interests, such as anime, manga, video games, computers or other highly enthusiastic hobbies. Its contemporary use originated with a 1983 essay by Akio Nakamori in '' Manga Burikko''. ...
'', and video game discussion.Anthony McCosker, Sonja Vivienne, Amelia Johns (Oct 12, 2016) ''Negotiating Digital Citizenship: Control, Contest and Culture''. Rowman & Littlefield. p. 134. Alt, Matt (Jun 23, 2020). ''Pure Invention: How Japan's Pop Culture Conquered the World.'' Crown. p. 273. . It became a popular gathering place for the controversial online '' incel'' community. The "beta uprising" or "beta rebellion" meme, the idea of taking revenge against women, jocks and others perceived as the cause of incels' problems, was popularized on the subsection. The perpetrator of the Toronto van attack referenced 4chan and an incel rebellion in a Facebook post he made prior to the attack, while praising self-identified incel Elliot Rodger, the killer behind the
2014 Isla Vista killings Two misogynistic terror, misogynistic terrorist attacks occurred in Isla Vista, California, United States on the evening of May 23, 2014. 22-year-old Elliot Rodger killed six people and injured fourteen others by gunshot, stabbing and vehicle ...
. He claims to have talked with both Harper-Mercer and Rodger on Reddit and 4chan and believes that he was part of a "beta uprising", also posting a message on 4chan about his intention the day before his attack.


/sci/

/sci/ is 4chan's science and mathematics board. On September 26, 2011, an anonymous user on /sci/ posted a question regarding the shortest possible way to watch all possible orders of episodes of the anime '' The Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya'' in nonchronological order. Shortly after, an anonymous user responded with a mathematical proof that argued viewers would have to watch at least 93,884,313,611 episodes to see all possible orderings. Seven years later, professional mathematicians recognized the mathematical proof as a partial solution to a superpermutations problem that was unsolved for 25 years. Australian mathematician
Greg Egan Greg Egan (born 20 August 1961) is an Australian science fiction writer and mathematician, best known for his works of hard science fiction. Egan has won multiple awards including the John W. Campbell Memorial Award, the Hugo Award, and the Lo ...
later published a proof inspired by the proof from the anonymous 4chan user, both of which are recognized as significant advances to the problem.


/soc/

/soc/ is 4chan's not-safe-for-work social board. It was launched in January 2011 after site founder Christopher Poole approved requests to move "rate my looks", webcam and other social threads off the high-traffic /b/ board into a dedicated space. Threads on /soc/ commonly feature "rate me" selfie evaluations and location-based posts intended to organize meet-ups. Posters frequently swap social media handles or
Discord Discord is an instant messaging and Voice over IP, VoIP social platform which allows communication through Voice over IP, voice calls, Videotelephony, video calls, text messaging, and digital media, media. Communication can be private or take ...
servers despite 4chan's usual emphasis on anonymity. On July 21, 2023, an anonymous user posted a link to a self-made
free and open source Free and open-source software (FOSS) is software available under a license that grants users the right to use, modify, and distribute the software modified or not to everyone free of charge. FOSS is an inclusive umbrella term encompassing free ...
dating app in a /soc/ thread, initially advertising it as an "experimental matchmaking algorithm". In May 2024, the app went viral, briefly outranking mainstream apps including eHarmony on
Google Play Google Play, also known as the Google Play Store, Play Store, or sometimes the Android Store (and was formerly Android Market), is a digital distribution service operated and developed by Google. It serves as the official app store for certifie ...
's "Top for $0" dating category despite the app's creator stating "it was only meant to be a meme app".
Mashable Mashable is a Online newspaper, news website, digital media platform and entertainment company founded by Pete Cashmore in 2005. History Mashable was founded by Pete Cashmore while living in Aberdeen, Scotland, in July 2004. Early iterations o ...
dubbed it "the 4chan dating app", describing it as "an amalgamation of other, better dating apps like
Grindr Grindr () is a location-based social networking and online dating application for gay, bisexual, queer, and transgender people. It was one of the first geosocial apps for gay men when it launched in March 2009, and has since become the large ...
and OkCupid."


/v/

/v/ is 4chan's
video games A video game or computer game is an electronic game that involves interaction with a user interface or input device (such as a joystick, game controller, controller, computer keyboard, keyboard, or motion sensing device) to generate visual fe ...
board. The board has spawned multiple Internet memes, most notably the NPC Wojak in 2016 (derived from the gaming term ''
non-player character A non-player character (NPC) is a character in a game that is not controlled by a player. The term originated in traditional tabletop role-playing games where it applies to characters controlled by the gamemaster (or referee) rather than by a ...
'' to describe those who do not think for themselves or make their own conscious decisions).


/x/

The "paranormal" board, /x/, is dedicated to discussing topics regarding unexplained phenomena, the
supernatural Supernatural phenomena or entities are those beyond the Scientific law, laws of nature. The term is derived from Medieval Latin , from Latin 'above, beyond, outside of' + 'nature'. Although the corollary term "nature" has had multiple meanin ...
, and non-political
conspiracy theories A conspiracy theory is an explanation for an event or situation that asserts the existence of a conspiracy (generally by powerful sinister groups, often political in motivation), when other explanations are more probable.Additional sources: * ...
. /x/ was initially launched in January 2005 as 4chan's general
photography Photography is the visual arts, art, application, and practice of creating images by recording light, either electronically by means of an image sensor, or chemically by means of a light-sensitive material such as photographic film. It is empl ...
board; in February 2007, it was repurposed as a paranormal-themed board. Many of the earliest creepypastas (Internet horror-related legends) were created on /x/. The idea of the Backrooms gained popularity thanks to a thread on /x/ created on 12 May 2019, where the users were asked to "post disquieting images that just feel 'off'." There, the first photo depicting the Backrooms was uploaded and another user commented on it with the first story about the Backrooms, claiming that one enters the Backrooms when they " noclip out of reality in the wrong areas". After the 4chan post gained fame, several Internet users wrote horror stories relating to the Backrooms. Many memes were created and shared across social media, further popularizing the creepypasta. American model Allison Harvard first gained notoriety in 2005 as an
Internet meme An Internet meme, or meme (, Help:Pronunciation respelling key, ''MEEM''), is a cultural item (such as an idea, behavior, or style) that spreads across the Internet, primarily through Social media, social media platforms. Internet memes manif ...
on the /x/ board where she became known as Creepy Chan. Known for her large eyes and peculiar interests like fascination with blood, photos she posted on her blog were widely circulated on the board. She gained mainstream notoriety in 2009 and again in 2011 by appearing on ''
America's Next Top Model ''America's Next Top Model'' (abbreviated ''ANTM'' and ''Top Model'') is an American reality television series and interactive competition in which a number of aspiring models compete for the title of "America's Next Top Model" and a chance to b ...
''. She would visit /x/ after new episodes of America's Next Top Model would air to see what was being written about her and participate in the discussions. The SCP Foundation, a fictional secret organization documented by the collaborative writing wiki project of the same name, originated on /x/ in 2007, when the first SCP file, SCP-173, was posted by an anonymous user. Initially a stand-alone short story, many additional SCP files were created shortly after; these new SCPs copied SCP-173's style and were set within the same
fictional universe A fictional universe, also known as an imagined universe or a constructed universe, is the internally consistent fictional setting used in a narrative or a work of art. This concept is most commonly associated with works of fantasy and scie ...
. A stand-alone wiki was created in January 2008 on the EditThis wiki hosting service to display the SCP articles. The EditThis website did not have moderators, or the ability to delete articles. Members communicated through individual article talk pages and the /x/ board. /x/ was the first place where the 2015 viral video '' 11B-X-1371'' was posted. The board also contributed to investigating and popularizing the controversial '' Sad Satan'' video game.


Internet culture


Early internet memes

" significant and influential element of contemporary internet culture", 4chan is responsible for many early
memes A meme (; ) is an idea, behavior, or style that spreads by means of imitation from person to person within a culture and often carries symbolic meaning representing a particular phenomenon or theme. A meme acts as a unit for carrying cultural ...
and the site has received positive attention for its association with memes. This included " So I herd u liek mudkipz", which involved a phrase based on Mudkip, a creature from the ''
Pokémon is a Japanese media franchise consisting of List of Pokémon video games, video games, Pokémon (TV series), animated series and List of Pokémon films, films, Pokémon Trading Card Game, a trading card game, and other related media. The fran ...
'' franchise, and which generated numerous YouTube tribute videos, and the term "''an hero''" as a synonym for
suicide Suicide is the act of intentionally causing one's own death. Risk factors for suicide include mental disorders, physical disorders, and substance abuse. Some suicides are impulsive acts driven by stress (such as from financial or ac ...
, after a misspelling in the
Myspace Myspace (formerly stylized as MySpace, currently myspace; and sometimes my␣, with an elongated Whitespace character#Substitute images, open box symbol) is a social networking service based in the United States. Launched on August 1, 2003, it w ...
online memorial An online memorial is a virtual space created on the Internet for the purpose of remembering, celebrating, or commemorating those who have died. An online memorial may be a one-page HTML webpage document giving the name of the deceased and a few w ...
of seventh grader Mitchell Henderson. 4chan and other websites, such as the satirical Encyclopedia Dramatica, have also contributed to the development of significant amounts of
leet Leet (or "1337"), also known as eleet or leetspeak, or simply hacker speech, is a system of modified spellings used primarily on the Internet. It often uses character replacements in ways that play on the similarity of their glyphs via refle ...
speak. A
lolcat A lolcat (pronounced ), or LOLcat, is an image macro of one or more cats. Lolcat images' Idiosyncrasy, idiosyncratic and intentionally grammatically incorrect text is known as lolspeak. Lolcat is a Compound (linguistics), compound word of the ...
is an image combining a photograph of a cat with solecistic text intended to contribute humour, widely popularized by 4chan in the form of a weekly post dedicated to them and a corresponding theme. In 2005, the installment of a word filter which changed "egg" to "duck", and thus "eggroll" to "duckroll", across 4chan led to a bait-and-switch meme in which users deceitfully linked to a picture of a duck on wheels. This was then modified into users linking to the music video for
Rick Astley Richard Paul Astley (born 6 February 1966) is an English singer, radio DJ and podcaster. He gained fame through his association with the production trio Stock Aitken Waterman, releasing the 1987 album ''Whenever You Need Somebody'', which sol ...
's 1987 song "
Never Gonna Give You Up "Never Gonna Give You Up" is a pop song by English singer Rick Astley, released on 27 July 1987. The song is widely regarded as Astley's most popular, as well as his List of signature songs, signature song, and it is often played at the end o ...
". Thus, the " rickroll" was born. A link to the YouTube video of Tay Zonday's song " Chocolate Rain" was posted on /b/ on July 11, 2007, and then subsequently circulated by users, becoming a very popular internet meme. The portion of the song in which Zonday turns away from the microphone, with a caption stating "I move away from the mic to breathe in", became an oft-repeated meme on 4chan and inspired remixes. Fellow YouTuber Boxxy's popularity was also due in part to 4chan. In his American incarnation, Pedobear is an anthropomorphic bear child predator that is often used within the community to mock contributors showing a sexual interest in children. Pedobear is one of the most popular memes on non-English imageboards, and has gained recognition across Europe, appearing in offline publications. It has been used as a symbol of pedophilia by Maltese graffiti vandals prior to a papal visit.


Anonymous and anti-Scientology activism

4chan has been labeled as the starting point of the Anonymous meme by The '' Baltimore City Paper'', due to the norm of posts signed with the "Anonymous" moniker. The ''
National Post The ''National Post'' is a Canadian English-language broadsheet newspaper and the flagship publication of the American-owned Postmedia Network. It is published Mondays through Saturdays, with Monday released as a digital e-edition only.
''s David George-Cosh said it has been "widely reported" that Anonymous is associated with 4chan and 711chan, as well as numerous
Internet Relay Chat IRC (Internet Relay Chat) is a text-based chat system for instant messaging. IRC is designed for Many-to-many, group communication in discussion forums, called ''#Channels, channels'', but also allows one-on-one communication via instant mess ...
(IRC) channels. Through its association with Anonymous, 4chan has become associated with Project Chanology, a worldwide protest against the
Church of Scientology The Church of Scientology is a group of interconnected corporate entities and other organizations devoted to the practice, administration and dissemination of Scientology, which is variously defined as a cult, a business, or a new religiou ...
held by members of Anonymous. On January 15, 2008, a 4chan user posted to /b/, suggesting participants "do something big" against the Church of Scientology's website. This message resulted in the Church receiving threatening phone calls. It quickly grew into a large real-world protest. Unlike previous Anonymous attacks, this action was characterized by 4chan
memes A meme (; ) is an idea, behavior, or style that spreads by means of imitation from person to person within a culture and often carries symbolic meaning representing a particular phenomenon or theme. A meme acts as a unit for carrying cultural ...
including rickrolls and Guy Fawkes masks. The raid drew criticism from some 4chan users who felt it would bring the site undesirable attention.


''My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic'' fandom

The adult fandom and subculture dedicated to the children's animated television series '' My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic'' began on the "Comics & Cartoons" (/co/) board of 4chan. The show was first discussed with some interest around its debut in October 2010. The users of /co/ took a heightened interest in the show after a critical
Cartoon Brew Cartoon Brew is an animation news website created by Amid Amidi and animation historian Jerry Beck that was launched on 15 March 2004. Cartoon Dump It also created '' Cartoon Dump'', a weekly podcast showing poorly made TV cartoons featuring ' ...
article was shared, resulting in praise for its plot, characters, and animation style. Discussion of the show extended to /b/, eventually to a point of contention. Discussion then spread forth to communities external to 4chan, including the establishment of the fan websites, causing the show to reach a wider audience across the internet.


"This post is art"

On July 30, 2014, an anonymous user made a reply in a thread on the board /pol/ "Politically Incorrect" of 4chan, criticizing modern art in an ironic fashion, saying: Less than an hour later the post was photographed off the screen and framed by another user who posted another reply in the thread with a photo of the framed quote. Later the user, after endorsement by other anonymous users in the thread, created an auction on
eBay eBay Inc. ( , often stylized as ebay) is an American multinational e-commerce company based in San Jose, California, that allows users to buy or view items via retail sales through online marketplaces and websites in 190 markets worldwide. ...
for the framed photo which quickly rose to high prices, culminating in a price of $90,900.


Controversies and harassment incidents


Internet raids

According to ''
The Washington Post ''The Washington Post'', locally known as ''The'' ''Post'' and, informally, ''WaPo'' or ''WP'', is an American daily newspaper published in Washington, D.C., the national capital. It is the most widely circulated newspaper in the Washington m ...
'', "the site's users have managed to pull off some of the highest-profile collective actions in the history of the Internet." Users of 4chan and other websites "raided"
Hal Turner Harold Charles "Hal" Turner (born March 15, 1962) is an American political commentator and convicted felon from North Bergen, New Jersey, North Bergen, New Jersey. Turner's viewpoints typically encompass Holocaust denial and white supremacy, ...
by launching
denial-of-service attack In computing, a denial-of-service attack (DoS attack) is a cyberattack in which the perpetrator seeks to make a machine or network resource unavailable to its intended users by temporarily or indefinitely disrupting services of a host co ...
s and
prank call A prank call (also known as a crank call, a hoax call, or a goof call) is a telephone call intended by the caller as a practical joke played on the person answering. It is often a type of nuisance call and can be illegal under certain circumsta ...
ing his phone-in radio show during December 2006 and January 2007. The attacks caused Turner's website to go offline. This cost thousands of dollars of bandwidth bills according to Turner. In response, Turner sued 4chan, 7chan, and other websites; however, he lost his plea for an
injunction An injunction is an equitable remedy in the form of a special court order compelling a party to do or refrain from doing certain acts. It was developed by the English courts of equity but its origins go back to Roman law and the equitable rem ...
and failed to receive letters from the court.
KTTV KTTV (channel 11) is a television station in Los Angeles, California, United States, serving as the West Coast of the United States, West Coast flagship (broadcasting), flagship station of the Fox Broadcasting Company, Fox network. It is owned a ...
Fox 11 aired a report on
Anonymous Anonymous may refer to: * Anonymity, the state of an individual's identity, or personally identifiable information, being publicly unknown ** Anonymous work, a work of art or literature that has an unnamed or unknown creator or author * Anonym ...
, calling them a group of "hackers on steroids", "domestic terrorists", and collectively an "Internet hate machine" on July 26, 2007.
Slashdot ''Slashdot'' (sometimes abbreviated as ''/.'') is a social news website that originally billed itself as "News for Nerds. Stuff that Matters". It features news stories on science, technology, and politics that are submitted and evaluated by site ...
founder Rob Malda posted a comment made by another Slashdot user, Miang, stating that the story focused mainly on users of "4chan, 7chan and 420chan". Miang claimed that the report "seems to confuse /b/ raids and motivational poster templates with a genuine threat to the American public", arguing that the "unrelated" footage of a van exploding shown in the report was to "equate anonymous posting with domestic terror". On July 10, 2008, the
swastika The swastika (卐 or 卍, ) is a symbol used in various Eurasian religions and cultures, as well as a few Indigenous peoples of Africa, African and Indigenous peoples of the Americas, American cultures. In the Western world, it is widely rec ...
CJK unicode character ( ) appeared at the top of
Google Google LLC (, ) is an American multinational corporation and technology company focusing on online advertising, search engine technology, cloud computing, computer software, quantum computing, e-commerce, consumer electronics, and artificial ...
's Hot Trends list—a tally of the most used search terms in the United States—for several hours. It was later reported that the
HTML Hypertext Markup Language (HTML) is the standard markup language for documents designed to be displayed in a web browser. It defines the content and structure of web content. It is often assisted by technologies such as Cascading Style Sheets ( ...
numeric character reference A numeric character reference (NCR) is a common markup construct used in SGML and SGML-derived markup languages such as HTML and XML. It consists of a short sequence of characters that, in turn, represents a single character. Since WebSgml, XM ...
for the symbol had been posted on /b/, with a request to perform a
Google search Google Search (also known simply as Google or Google.com) is a search engine operated by Google. It allows users to search for information on the World Wide Web, Web by entering keywords or phrases. Google Search uses algorithms to analyze an ...
for the string. A multitude of /b/ visitors followed the order and pushed the symbol to the top of the chart, though Google later removed the result. Later that year, the private Yahoo! Mail account of
Sarah Palin Sarah Louise Palin (; Heath; born February 11, 1964) is an American politician, commentator, and author who served as the ninth governor of Alaska from 2006 until her resignation in 2009. She was the 2008 Republican vice presidential nomi ...
, Republican vice presidential candidate in the
2008 United States presidential election Presidential elections were held in the United States on November 4, 2008. The Democratic ticket of Barack Obama, the junior senator from Illinois, and Joe Biden, the senior senator from Delaware, defeated the Republican ticket of John Mc ...
, was hacked by a 4chan user. The hacker posted the account's password on /b/, and
screenshot A screenshot (also known as screen capture or screen grab) is an analog or digital image that shows the contents of a computer display. A screenshot is created by a (film) camera shooting the screen or the operating system An operating sys ...
s from within the account to
WikiLeaks WikiLeaks () is a non-profit media organisation and publisher of leaked documents. It is funded by donations and media partnerships. It has published classified documents and other media provided by anonymous sources. It was founded in 2006 by ...
. A /b/ user then logged in and changed the password, posting a screenshot of him sending an email to a friend of Palin's informing her of the new password on the /b/ thread. However, he forgot to blank out the password in the screenshot. A multitude of /b/ users attempted to log in with the new password, and the account was automatically locked out by Yahoo!. The incident was criticized by some /b/ users. One user commented, "seriously, /b/. We could have changed history and failed, epically." The
FBI The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) is the domestic Intelligence agency, intelligence and Security agency, security service of the United States and Federal law enforcement in the United States, its principal federal law enforcement ag ...
and
Secret Service A secret service is a government agency, intelligence agency, or the activities of a government agency, concerned with the gathering of intelligence data. The tasks and powers of a secret service can vary greatly from one country to another. For i ...
began investigating the incident shortly after its occurrence. On September 20 it was revealed they were questioning David Kernell, the son of Democratic Tennessee State Representative Mike Kernell. The stock price of
Apple Inc. Apple Inc. is an American multinational corporation and technology company headquartered in Cupertino, California, in Silicon Valley. It is best known for its consumer electronics, software, and services. Founded in 1976 as Apple Comput ...
fell significantly in October 2008 after a hoax story was submitted to
CNN Cable News Network (CNN) is a multinational news organization operating, most notably, a website and a TV channel headquartered in Atlanta. Founded in 1980 by American media proprietor Ted Turner and Reese Schonfeld as a 24-hour cable ne ...
's user-generated news site iReport.com claiming that company CEO
Steve Jobs Steven Paul Jobs (February 24, 1955 – October 5, 2011) was an American businessman, inventor, and investor best known for co-founding the technology company Apple Inc. Jobs was also the founder of NeXT and chairman and majority shareholder o ...
had suffered a major heart attack. The source of the story was traced back to 4chan. In May 2009, members of the site attacked
YouTube YouTube is an American social media and online video sharing platform owned by Google. YouTube was founded on February 14, 2005, by Steve Chen, Chad Hurley, and Jawed Karim who were three former employees of PayPal. Headquartered in ...
, posting
pornographic Pornography (colloquially called porn or porno) is sexually suggestive material, such as a picture, video, text, or audio, intended for sexual arousal. Made for consumption by adults, pornographic depictions have evolved from cave paintings ...
videos on the video-sharing platform under names of teenage celebrities. The attack spawned the popular
Internet meme An Internet meme, or meme (, Help:Pronunciation respelling key, ''MEEM''), is a cultural item (such as an idea, behavior, or style) that spreads across the Internet, primarily through Social media, social media platforms. Internet memes manif ...
and catchphrase "I'm 12 years old and what is this?" as a response to a user comment on one such video. A 4chan member acknowledged being part of the attack, telling
BBC News BBC News is an operational business division of the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) responsible for the gathering and broadcasting of news and current affairs in the UK and around the world. The department is the world's largest broad ...
that it was in response to YouTube "deleting music". In January 2010, members of the site attacked YouTube again in response to the suspension of YouTube user lukeywes1234 for failing to meet the minimum age requirement of thirteen. The videos uploaded by the user had apparently become popular with 4chan members, who subsequently became angered after the account was suspended and called for a new wave of pornographic videos to be uploaded to YouTube on January 6, 2010. Later the same year, 4chan made numerous disruptive pranks directed at singer
Justin Bieber Justin Drew Bieber ( ; born March 1, 1994) is a Canadian singer. Regarded as a pop icon, he is recognized for his multi-genre musical performances. He was discovered by record executive Scooter Braun in 2008 and subsequently brought to the U ...
. In September 2010, in retaliation against the
Bollywood Hindi cinema, popularly known as Bollywood and formerly as Bombay cinema, is primarily produced in Mumbai. The popular term Bollywood is a portmanteau of "Bombay" (former name of Mumbai) and "Cinema of the United States, Hollywood". The in ...
film industry's hiring of Aiplex Software to launch cyberattacks against
The Pirate Bay The Pirate Bay, commonly abbreviated as TPB, is a free searchable online index of Film, movies, music, video games, Pornographic film, pornography and software. Founded in 2003 by Swedish think tank , The Pirate Bay facilitates the connection ...
, Anonymous members, recruited through posts on 4chan boards, subsequently initiated their own attacks, dubbed Operation Payback, targeting the website of the
Motion Picture Association of America The Motion Picture Association (MPA) is an American trade association representing the Major film studios, five major film studios of the Cinema of the United States, United States, the Major film studios#Mini-majors, mini-major Amazon MGM Stud ...
and the
Recording Industry Association of America The Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) is a trade organization that represents the music recording industry in the United States. Its members consist of record labels and distributors that the RIAA says "create, manufacture, and/o ...
. The targeted websites usually went offline for a short period of time due to the attacks, before recovering. The website of the UK law firm ACS:Law, which was associated with an anti-piracy client, was affected by the cyber-attack. In retaliation for the initial attacks being called only a minor nuisance, Anonymous launched more attacks, bringing the site down yet again. After coming back up, the front page accidentally revealed a backup file of the entire website, which contained over 300 megabytes of private company emails, which were leaked to several torrents and across several sites on the Internet. It was suggested that the data leak could cost the law firm up to £500,000 in fines for breaching British Data Protection Laws. In January 2011, BBC News reported that the law firm announced they were to stop "chasing illegal file-sharers". Head of ACS:Law Andrew Crossley in a statement to a court addressed issues which influenced the decision to back down "I have ceased my work ... I have been subject to criminal attack. My e-mails have been hacked. I have had death threats and bomb threats." In August 2012, 4chan users attacked a third-party sponsored
Mountain Dew Mountain Dew, stylized as Mtn Dew in some countries and colloquially known as Dew in some areas, is a soft drink brand owned by PepsiCo. The original formula was invented in 1940 by Tennessee beverage Bottler (company), bottlers Barney and A ...
campaign, ''Dub the Dew'', where users were asked to submit and vote on name ideas for a green apple flavor of the drink. Users submitted entries such as " Diabeetus", "Fapple", several variations of "Gushing Granny", and " Hitler did nothing wrong".


Threats of violence

On October 18, 2006, the
Department of Homeland Security The United States Department of Homeland Security (DHS) is the U.S. federal executive department responsible for public security, roughly comparable to the interior, home, or public security ministries in other countries. Its missions invol ...
warned
National Football League The National Football League (NFL) is a Professional gridiron football, professional American football league in the United States. Composed of 32 teams, it is divided equally between the American Football Conference (AFC) and the National ...
officials in
Miami Miami is a East Coast of the United States, coastal city in the U.S. state of Florida and the county seat of Miami-Dade County, Florida, Miami-Dade County in South Florida. It is the core of the Miami metropolitan area, which, with a populat ...
,
New York City New York, often called New York City (NYC), is the most populous city in the United States, located at the southern tip of New York State on one of the world's largest natural harbors. The city comprises five boroughs, each coextensive w ...
,
Atlanta Atlanta ( ) is the List of capitals in the United States, capital and List of municipalities in Georgia (U.S. state), most populous city in the U.S. state of Georgia (U.S. state), Georgia. It is the county seat, seat of Fulton County, Georg ...
,
Seattle Seattle ( ) is the most populous city in the U.S. state of Washington and in the Pacific Northwest region of North America. With a population of 780,995 in 2024, it is the 18th-most populous city in the United States. The city is the cou ...
,
Houston Houston ( ) is the List of cities in Texas by population, most populous city in the U.S. state of Texas and in the Southern United States. Located in Southeast Texas near Galveston Bay and the Gulf of Mexico, it is the county seat, seat of ...
,
Oakland Oakland is a city in the East Bay region of the San Francisco Bay Area in the U.S. state of California. It is the county seat and most populous city in Alameda County, with a population of 440,646 in 2020. A major West Coast port, Oakland is ...
, and
Cleveland Cleveland is a city in the U.S. state of Ohio and the county seat of Cuyahoga County. Located along the southern shore of Lake Erie, it is situated across the Canada–U.S. maritime border and approximately west of the Ohio-Pennsylvania st ...
about a possible threat involving the simultaneous use of dirty bombs at stadiums. The threat claimed that the attack would be carried out on October 22, the final day of the Muslim holy month of
Ramadan Ramadan is the ninth month of the Islamic calendar. It is observed by Muslims worldwide as a month of fasting (''Fasting in Islam, sawm''), communal prayer (salah), reflection, and community. It is also the month in which the Quran is believed ...
. Both the
FBI The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) is the domestic Intelligence agency, intelligence and Security agency, security service of the United States and Federal law enforcement in the United States, its principal federal law enforcement ag ...
and the Department of Homeland Security expressed doubt concerning the credibility of the threats, but warned the relevant organizations as a precaution. The threat turned out to be an ill-conceived hoax perpetrated by a grocery store clerk in Wisconsin with no terrorist ties. The FBI considered it a clearly frivolous threat and the 20-year-old man was charged with fabricating a terrorist threat, sentenced to six months in prison followed by six months' house arrest, and ordered to pay $26,750 in
restitution Restitution and unjust enrichment is the field of law relating to gains-based recovery. In contrast with damages (the law of compensation), restitution is a claim or remedy requiring a defendant to give up benefits wrongfully obtained. Liability ...
. Around midnight on September 11, 2007, a student posted photographs of mock
pipe bomb A pipe bomb is an improvised explosive device (IED) that uses a tightly sealed section of pipe filled with an explosive material. The containment provided by the pipe means that simple low explosives can be used to produce a relatively larg ...
s and another photograph of him holding them while saying he would blow up his high school—Pflugerville High School in Pflugerville, Texas—at 9:11 am on September 11. Users of 4chan helped to track him down by finding the perpetrator's father's name in the
Exif Exchangeable image file format (officially Exif, according to JEIDA/JEITA/CIPA specifications) is a standard that specifies formats for images, sound, and ancillary tags used by digital cameras (including smartphones), scanners and other system ...
data of a photograph he took, and contacted the police. He was arrested before school began that day. The incident turned out to be a hoax; the "weapons" were toys and there were no actual bombs. A 20-year-old from Melbourne, Australia, was arrested on December 8, 2007, after apparently posting on 4chan that he was "going to shoot and kill as many people as I can until which time I am incapacitated or killed by the police". The post, accompanied by an image of another man holding a shotgun, threatened a shopping mall near
Beverly Hills Beverly Hills is a city located in Los Angeles County, California, United States. A notable and historic suburb of Los Angeles, it is located just southwest of the Hollywood Hills, approximately northwest of downtown Los Angeles. Beverly Hil ...
. While the investigation was still open, he was charged with criminal defamation for a separate incident but died before the case was heard. On February 4, 2009, a posting on the 4chan /b/ board said there would be a
school shooting A school shooting is an Gun violence, armed attack at an educational institution, such as a primary school, secondary school, high school or university, involving the use of a firearm. Many school shootings are also categorized as mass shooti ...
at St Eskils Gymnasium in
Eskilstuna Eskilstuna () is a Urban areas in Sweden, city and the seat of Eskilstuna Municipality, Södermanland County, Sweden. The city of Eskilstuna had 69,948 inhabitants in 2020, with a total population of 107,806 inhabitants in Eskilstuna municipality ...
, Sweden, leading 1,250 students and 50 teachers to be evacuated. A 21-year-old man was arrested after 4chan provided the police with the
IP address An Internet Protocol address (IP address) is a numerical label such as that is assigned to a device connected to a computer network that uses the Internet Protocol for communication. IP addresses serve two main functions: network interface i ...
of the poster. Police said that the suspect called it off as a joke, and they released him after they found no indication that the threat was serious. On June 28, 2018, a man was arrested following an indictment by the U.S. Department of Justice "on one count of transmitting in interstate and foreign commerce a threat to injure the person of another." The indictment alleged that he posted anonymously to /pol/ the day after the
Unite the Right rally The Unite the Right rally was a White supremacy#United States, white supremacist rally that took place in Charlottesville, Virginia, from August 11 to 12, 2017. Marchers included members of the alt-right, neo-Confederates, neo-fascists, whi ...
, communicating an intention to attack protestors at an upcoming right-wing demonstration, ostensibly to elicit sympathy for the
alt-right The alt-right (abbreviated from alternative right) is a Far-right politics, far-right, White nationalism, white nationalist movement. A largely Internet activism, online phenomenon, the alt-right originated in the United States during the late ...
movement. "I'm going to bring a Remington 700 and start shooting Alt-right guys. We need sympathy after that landwhale got all the liberals teary eyed, so someone is going to have to make it look like the left is becoming more violent and radicalized. It's a false flag for sure, but I'll be aiming for the more tanned/dark haired muddied jeans in the crowd so real whites won't have to worry," he wrote, according to the indictment. In 2023, a 38-year-old of Monmouth Junction, New Jersey, was arrested for threatening Volusia County, Florida sheriff Mike Chitwood on 4chan due to Chitwood's condemnation of
anti-Semitism Antisemitism or Jew-hatred is hostility to, prejudice towards, or discrimination against Jews. A person who harbours it is called an antisemite. Whether antisemitism is considered a form of racism depends on the school of thought. Antisemi ...
. According to authorities, the poster, who lived 974 miles away from Volusia County, advocated "shoot ngChitwood in the head and murder nghim" in a February 22 post. In April of that same year, two other 4chan users, residents of
California California () is a U.S. state, state in the Western United States that lies on the West Coast of the United States, Pacific Coast. It borders Oregon to the north, Nevada and Arizona to the east, and shares Mexico–United States border, an ...
and
Connecticut Connecticut ( ) is a U.S. state, state in the New England region of the Northeastern United States. It borders Rhode Island to the east, Massachusetts to the north, New York (state), New York to the west, and Long Island Sound to the south. ...
respectively, were also arrested for threatening to kill Chitwood on 4chan. On the evening of April 2 and morning of April 3, 2024, two threats were posted on 4chan claiming there was a bomb in the Norwegian parliament building. Oslo police closed down the parliament building while the Norwegian Police Security Service carried out an investigation. No bomb was found in the building. The culprit behind the threats was not identified and nobody was arrested in relation to the case.


Celebrity photo leaks

On August 31, 2014, a compromise of user passwords at
iCloud iCloud is the personal cloud service of Apple Inc. Launched on October 12, 2011, iCloud enables users to store and Data synchronization, sync data across devices, including Apple Mail, Calendar (Apple), Apple Calendar, Photos (Apple), Apple Ph ...
allowed a large number of private photographs taken by celebrities to be posted online, initially on 4chan. As a result of the incident, 4chan announced that it would enforce a
Digital Millennium Copyright Act The Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA) is a 1998 United States copyright law that implements two 1996 treaties of the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO). It criminalizes production and dissemination of technology, devices, or ...
policy, which would allow content owners to remove material that had been shared on the site illegally, and would ban users who repeatedly posted stolen material.


Gamergate

Also in August 2014, 4chan was involved in the Gamergate controversy, which began with unsubstantiated allegations about indie game developer Zoë Quinn from an ex-boyfriend, followed by false allegations from anonymous Internet users. The allegations were followed by a harassment campaign against several women in the video game industry, organized by 4chan users, particularly /r9k/. Discussion regarding Gamergate was banned on 4chan due to alleged rule violations, and Gamergate supporters moved to alternate forums such as 8chan.


Murder in Port Orchard, Washington

According to court documents filed on November 5, 2014, there were images posted to 4chan that appeared to be of a murder victim. The body was discovered in Port Orchard, Washington, after the images were posted. The posts were accompanied by the text: "Turns out it's way harder to strangle someone to death than it looks on the movies." A later post said: "Check the news for Port Orchard, Washington, in a few hours. Her son will be home from school soon. He'll find her, then call the cops. I just wanted to share the pics before they find me." The victim was Amber Lynn Coplin, aged 30. The suspect, 33-year-old David Michael Kalac, surrendered to police in Oregon later the same day; he was charged with second-degree murder involving domestic violence. Kalac was convicted in April 2017 and was sentenced to 82 years in prison the following month.


Death of Jeffrey Epstein

A report of
Jeffrey Epstein Jeffrey Edward Epstein ( , ; January 20, 1953August 10, 2019) was an American financier and child sex offender. Born and raised in New York City, Epstein began his professional career as a teacher at the Dalton School, despite lacking a col ...
's death was posted on /pol/ around 40 minutes before
ABC News ABC News most commonly refers to: * ABC News (Australia), a national news service of the Australian Broadcasting Corporation * ABC News (United States), a news-gathering and broadcasting division of the American Broadcasting Company ABC News may a ...
broke the news. It was originally suspected that the unidentified person who made the posts may have been a
first responder A first responder is a person with specialized training who is among the first to arrive and provide assistance or incident resolution at the scene of an emergency. First responders typically include Law enforcement, law enforcement officers (co ...
, prompting a review by the New York City Fire Department, who later stated that the post did not come from a member of its department.


2022 Buffalo shooting

On May 14, 2022, a
mass shooting A mass shooting is a violent crime in which one or more attackers use a firearm to Gun violence, kill or injure multiple individuals in rapid succession. There is no widely accepted specific definition, and different organizations tracking su ...
occurred at a supermarket in
Buffalo, New York Buffalo is a Administrative divisions of New York (state), city in the U.S. state of New York (state), New York and county seat of Erie County, New York, Erie County. It lies in Western New York at the eastern end of Lake Erie, at the head of ...
, US. The accused, Payton S. Gendron, is reported to have written a racist
manifesto A manifesto is a written declaration of the intentions, motives, or views of the issuer, be it an individual, group, political party, or government. A manifesto can accept a previously published opinion or public consensus, but many prominent ...
released May 12 (two days before the shooting), with the manifesto including birth date and other biographical details that match the suspect in custody. In the manifesto the author writes that in May 2020 he began to frequent 4chan, including its "Politically Incorrect" message board /pol/, where he was introduced to the Great Replacement conspiracy theory.


2025 investigation by British government

On June 10, 2025,
Ofcom The Office of Communications, commonly known as Ofcom, is the government-approved regulatory and competition authority for the broadcasting, internet, telecommunications and mail, postal industries of the United Kingdom. Ofcom has wide-rang ...
, the
British government His Majesty's Government, abbreviated to HM Government or otherwise UK Government, is the central government, central executive authority of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland.
's communications regulator, announced an investigation into 4chan for potential violations of the
Online Safety Act 2023 The Online Safety Act 2023 (c. 50) is an act of the Parliament of the United Kingdom to regulate online content. Designed to protect children and adults online, it passed on 26 October 2023 and gives the relevant Secretary of State the power, s ...
, which took effect in the United Kingdom in April 2025. According to
BBC News BBC News is an operational business division of the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) responsible for the gathering and broadcasting of news and current affairs in the UK and around the world. The department is the world's largest broad ...
, "Ofcom says it requested 4chan's risk assessment in April but has not had any response." The news agency also reported, "Ofcom has the power to fine companies up to 10% of their global revenues, or £18m — whichever is the greater number."


ISP bans


AT&T temporary ban

On July 26, 2009,
AT&T AT&T Inc., an abbreviation for its predecessor's former name, the American Telephone and Telegraph Company, is an American multinational telecommunications holding company headquartered at Whitacre Tower in Downtown Dallas, Texas. It is the w ...
's
DSL Digital subscriber line (DSL; originally digital subscriber loop) is a family of technologies that are used to transmit digital data over telephone lines. In telecommunications marketing, the term DSL is widely understood to mean asymmetric di ...
branch temporarily blocked access to the img.4chan.org domain (host of /b/ and /r9k/), which was initially believed to be an attempt at Internet censorship, and met with hostility on 4chan's part. The next day, AT&T issued a statement claiming that the block was put in place after an AT&T customer was affected by a DoS attack originating from IP addresses connected to ''img.4chan.org'', and was an attempt to "prevent this attack from disrupting service for the impacted AT&T customer, and... our other customers." AT&T maintains that the block was not related to the content on 4chan. 4chan's founder Christopher Poole responded with the following: Major news outlets have reported that the issue may be related to the DDoS-ing of 4chan, and that 4chan users suspected the then-owner of Swedish-based website ''Anontalk.com''.


Verizon temporary ban

On February 4, 2010, 4chan started receiving reports from Verizon Wireless customers that they were having difficulties accessing the site's image boards. After investigating, Poole found out that only the traffic on
port A port is a maritime facility comprising one or more wharves or loading areas, where ships load and discharge cargo and passengers. Although usually situated on a sea coast or estuary, ports can also be found far inland, such as Hamburg, Manch ...
80 to the ''boards.4chan.org'' domain was affected, leading members to believe that the block was intentional. Three days later, Verizon Wireless confirmed that 4chan was "explicitly blocked". The block was lifted several days later.


Telstra ban

On March 20, 2019, Australian telecom company
Telstra Telstra Group Limited is an Australian telecommunications company that builds and operates telecommunications networks and markets related products and services. It is a member of the S&P/ASX 20 stock index, and is Australia's largest telecomm ...
denied access to millions of Australians to 4chan, 8chan, Zero Hedge, and LiveLeak as a reaction to the Christchurch mosque shootings.


New Zealand

Following the Christchurch mosque shootings, numerous ISPs temporarily blocked any site hosting a copy of the livestream of the shooting, including 4chan. The ISPs included Spark,
Vodafone Vodafone Group Public Limited Company () is a British Multinational company, multinational telecommunications company. Its registered office and global headquarters are in Newbury, Berkshire, England. It predominantly operates Service (economic ...
, Vocus, and 2degrees.


See also

*
List of Internet phenomena Internet phenomena are social and cultural phenomena specific to the Internet, such as Internet memes, which include popular catchphrases, images, viral videos, and jokes. When such fads and sensations occur online, they tend to grow rapidly ...
* Pepe the Frog International: * 8kun/8chan, America * Dvach (2ch), Russia * Ylilauta, Finland *
2channel , also known as 2ch, Channel 2, and sometimes retrospectively as 2ch.net, was an anonymous Japanese textboard founded in 1999 by Hiroyuki Nishimura. Described in 2007 as "Japan's most popular online community", the site had a level of influe ...
, Japan * Ilbe Storehouse, South Korea


Notes


References


Bibliography

*


Further reading

* *


External links

*
Archived TED talk about 4chan by its creator
{{Authority control 2channel Anonymous social media Internet memes Internet properties established in 2003 Internet trolling Online obscenity controversies 2000s fads and trends 2010s fads and trends 2020s fads and trends