This report presents the major trends in online targeted violence in the United States in 2025, drawing on data from Moonshot's Threat Bulletin—our ongoing monitoring of more than 30 mainstream and fringe social media platforms. The year 2025 marked a fundamental shift in how online threats of violence translate to offline violence. Four defining patterns that represent structural evolutions in the threat landscape emerged:
- Youth radicalization through violent nihilistic networks reached unprecedented levels. Children and teenagers moved from online engagement to planned or executed attacks at alarming rates, with nearly all attackers connected to these networks under age 18.
- Political violence functioned as a powerful trigger activating coordinated targeting across multiple unrelated communities simultaneously. Single incidents generated threats against politicians, LGBTQ+, Black, Jewish, immigrant, and Muslim communities through distinct but reinforcing narratives.
- Immigration discourse solidified how various communities are portrayed within Great Replacement frameworks, entrenching a narrative that enables the targeting of multiple groups at once.
- Technical barriers to large-scale harassment collapsed as online communities exploited accessible AI, swatting-as-a-service, and automated targeting tools.