In August, Pulitzer-Prize-winning journalist Glenn Greenwald made a surprising announcement: a partnership with a little-known video streaming service called Rumble.
For Rumble, the deal looks like an attempt to grow its user base beyond fans of former President Donald Trump. For Greenwald, the move represents a protest against Silicon Valley’s attempt to police content online.
“Unlike Youtube, Facebook, and Twitter, which began wildly expanding how the rules are applied for broader society to remove so-called ‘disinformation,’ Rumble just stayed true to the original mission,” Greenwald explained in a recent interview.
“You can’t go on there and say racist stuff, but they don’t monitor for what’s true or false. They really believe in true debate.”
And Greenwald isn’t the only one joining the new service.
Dozens of well known conservative personalities, including Ron Paul, Tim Pool, and Donald Trump Jr., regularly post videos on the site.
And recently, Rumble announced a partnership with former Democratic congresswoman Tulsi Gabbard and comedian Bridget Phetasy, in addition to a dozen or so other celebrity contributors.
All of which begs the question…
Exactly what is Rumble? Where did the site come from? And do security professionals need to pay attention?
What is Rumble?
Canada-based Rumble is a small but fast-growing video sharing platform that has positioned itself as the leading alternative to YouTube.
CEO Chris Pavlovski launched the site in 2013. And originally, most of the content consisted of viral videos published elsewhere.
But over the past year, the site’s user base has ballooned 25-fold. And today, Rumble claims to have over 30 million monthly active users.
If you visit the site, you’ll find a homepage that closely resembles other video streaming services.
Users see a list of featured content and a list of trending topics and videos. And like YouTube, publishers upload content to ‘channels,’ with regular videos posted around a common theme.
Visitors can also create an account. Once signed up, users have the ability to view comments, like videos (called ‘Rumbles’), and leave feedback on content.
