Extremism researchers are combing through the digital footprint believed to be left behind by the man accused of shooting 13 people, killing 10 of them, in a racially motivated attack at a Buffalo supermarket.

Among the materials is a nearly 600 page chat log written by an individual who identifies himself as Payton Gendron, the same name as the killing suspect, documenting roughly six months of personal reflections and activities leading up to the attack. The record, created on the social chat platform Discord, paints a picture of a committed racist obsessed with the mechanics of planning and executing a deadly mass shooting.

Among the questions that experts are bringing to the document are: what red flags might have been missed by those around this individual? Where might there have been an intervention? And, what insight might it offer on what differentiates someone who carries out a violent attack from others who may share similar extremist views?

But they also caution that the record should be read with a degree of skepticism.

“Although he is seemingly candidly laying out his thoughts and observations on the world [and] his planning for the attack, he’s also writing for an audience,” said Emerson Brooking, resident senior fellow at the Digital Forensic Research Lab of the Atlantic Council. “So that means any content in the document we should treat with some suspicion.”

Missing pieces

The log, which appears to have functioned as a sort of digital diary for its author, was kept on the chat platform Discord. Shortly before the attack, its author shared a link pointing to a PDF printout of the log on another social media platform. The record at times suggests that the author was speaking to an audience during the six months he posted to the log. But a Discord spokesperson said nobody else appears to have had access to the server until just prior to the rampage.

“Approximately 30 minutes prior to the attack … a small group of people were invited to and joined the server,” a Discord spokesperson wrote in a statement. “Before that, our records indicate no other people saw the diary chat log in this private server.”

Although Discord took down the server where the document and chat log were located, copies continue to circulate online. Throughout, the author of the log writes extensively about his efforts to acquire and test equipment for the attack, and his process of determining where he would carry it out. He periodically keeps track of mundane daily details, such as his exercise routine and food intake. But researchers note that content relating to the author’s racist and anti-Semitic beliefs largely draws from other sources.

“He often lets the manifestos of previous white supremacist terrorists speak for him,” said Brooking.

The document’s author repeatedly indicates that he has edited the chat log before releasing it to the public. That, and the timeline of entries that show blocks of missing dates, has raised just as much interest around what is missing from the record as what is contained in it.

“It’s kind of like why did he delete this whole section?” said Kesa White, a program research associate at American University’s Polarization and Extremism Research Innovation Lab. “Somebody might have been privy to information [about his planning the attack] but he deleted it because it incriminated someone.”

The writings suggest that a livestreamed video of another white terrorist attack that took place in 2019 in Christchurch, New Zealand, in which 51 people were killed, was inspiration behind the massacre in Buffalo. And from the very beginning of the record, it is clear that the writer had committed to a path of violence.

“What really stands out is the inevitability with which he speaks about the attack. He has resolved months in advance that he is going to murder people for this racist cause,” said Brooking. “And although he often expresses doubt and suicidal ideation, he still treats it as is inevitable that he’s going to do this thing.”

Red flags and missed signs

According to the log, the author’s suicidal ideations did come to the attention of others on at least one occasion. In an incident that he revisits several times, he recounts being sent to an emergency room for nearly a full day in May 2021 after writing “murder/suicide” in response to the question “What do you want to do when you retire?” on a school assignment. Calling it a “bad experience,” he described it as a significant moment for him.

“This experience only helped to prove my belief that people, even certified doctors, are not concerned about helping you,” he wrote.

He noted that at that point he was already contemplating an attack, and so he lied and said he was making a joke. “That is the reason I believe I am still able to purchase guns,” he wrote.

The document also raises questions about his parents’ awareness of his activities and mental state. In one instance, he wrote about chasing and decapitating a cat. Then, he wrote that his mother helped him bury it.

“That’s a very big deal,” said White, whose research also includes work on serial killers. “You see that’s one of the big things that serial killers have in common … [is] the killing of animals. So all of the red flags were there.”

The writings also raise questions about whether school administrators at SUNY Broome, where the suspect was enrolled in an Engineering Science program, missed warning signs. The author’s log shows that over time he devoted ever greater amounts of time to preparing for the mass shooting. Eventually, he writes that he dropped out of college because he had missed so many classes.

In an e-mail to NPR sent Saturday evening, a SUNY Broome spokesperson confirmed that the suspect is not currently enrolled. But the statement said the university would “rely on the investigating agencies to release any additional information, as appropriate.”

When asked specifically about whether the school missed any red flags, a SUNY Broome spokesperson declined to comment Friday and referred to the previously made statement.

“I am left wondering why an intervention did not occur?” said Brooking. “How he fell so completely through the cracks and, for the better part of a year, saw as his full-time job writing a manifesto and preparing to commit an act of terrorism.”

Unique concern about this online diary

The digital diary asserts that the author was first exposed to the racist conspiracy theory known as the Great Replacement, and then was inspired to commit a mass shooting, by materials he accessed online of the Christchurch, shooter. He also cites screeds posted by a number of other violent extremists, including a domestic terrorist who killed 77 people in attacks in Norway in 2011. Extremism researchers are worried that writings and video believed to be linked to the Buffalo gunman will add to the radicalizing materials that copycats look at online, and that they may even prove more harmful than what was available before the attack.

“I’m very concerned about this because for other young men in his position, they are going to find these documents and they are going to be inspired because they might read the words of of a young man who reminds them of themselves,” said Brooking.

Brooking notes that, at several points in the log, the writer expresses self-doubt about carrying out the attack and even acknowledges the humanity of some of his would-be victims. On a trip to Buffalo in March, where he writes of visiting the city to map out the attack in more detail, he writes of experiencing a panic attack.

“I find that concerning because it it opens the door for other would-be shooters to empathize with him in a way that they might not with other terrorists,” said Brooking. “They might read the words of a young man who reminds them of themselves. And it is that personal element of these documents which I think may be one of their darkest legacy in the years to come.”

SEOUL, South Korea — North Korea on Thursday fired two suspected ballistic missiles into the sea in its sixth round of weapons launches this month, South Korea’s military said.

Experts say North Korea’s unusually fast pace in testing activity underscores an intent to pressure the Biden administration over long-stalled negotiations aimed at exchanging a release of crippling U.S.-led sanctions against the North and the North’s denuclearization steps.

The renewed pressure comes as the pandemic further shakes the North’s economy, which was already battered by crippling U.S.-led sanctions over its nuclear weapons program and decades of mismanagement by its own government.

South Korea’s Joint Chiefs of Staff said the weapons, which were likely short-range, were launched five minutes apart from the eastern coastal town of Hamhung and flew 190 kilometers (118 miles) on an apogee of 20 kilometers (12.4 miles) before landing at sea.

Aviation authorities issued a Notice to Airmen, or NOTAM, for pilots operating in South Korean airspace, advising them of a “missile launched from North Korea” and that they maintain close communication with air traffic controls, according to the website of South Korea’s Office of Civil Aviation.

The U.S. Indo Pacific Command said the latest launches, while highlighting the destabilizing impact of North Korea’s weapons program, didn’t pose an “immediate threat to U.S. personnel or territory, or to our allies.

Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida confirmed there were no reports of damage to vessel and aircraft around the Japanese coast. He called the North’s repeated missile firings as “extremely regrettable” and violations of U.N. Security Council resolutions.

Senior South Korean security and military officials gathered for an emergency National Security Council meeting where they expressed strong regret over the North’s continuing launches and urged Pyongyang to recommit to dialogue, Seoul’s presidential office said.

The North also last week issued a veiled threat to resume the testing of nuclear explosives and long-range missiles targeting the American homeland, which leader Kim Jong Un suspended in 2018 while initiating diplomacy with the United States.

Kim’s high-stakes summitry with then-President Donald Trump derailed in 2019 after the Americans rejected North Korea’s demands for major sanctions relief in exchange for a partial surrender of its nuclear capabilities.

Some experts say North Korea could dramatically escalate weapons demonstrations after the Winter Olympics, which begin Feb. 4 in China, the North’s main ally and economic lifeline.

They say Pyongyang’s leadership likely feels it could use a dramatic provocation to move the needle with the Biden administration, which has been preoccupied with bigger adversaries including China and Russia.

The Biden administration has offered open-ended talks but showed no willingness to ease sanctions unless Kim takes real steps to abandon the nuclear weapons and missiles he sees as his strongest guarantee of survival.

The North has been ramping up its testing activity since last fall, demonstrating various missiles and delivery systems apparently designed to overwhelm missile defense systems in the region.

Experts say Kim is trying to apply more pressure on rivals Washington and Seoul to accept it as a nuclear power in hopes of winning relief from economic sanctions and convert the diplomacy with Washington into mutual arms-reduction negotiations.

Thursday’s launch came two days after South Korea’s military detected the North flight-testing two suspected cruise missile at an unspecified inland area.

North Korea opened 2022 with a pair of test-firings of a purported hypersonic missile, which Kim described as an asset that would remarkably bolster his nuclear “war deterrent.”

The North also this month test-fired two different types of short-range ballistic missiles it has developed since 2019 that are designed to be maneuverable and fly at low altitudes, which experts say potentially improve their chances of evading and defeating missile defense systems.

In a ruling party meeting attended by Kim last week, the North accused the Biden administration of hostility and threats and said it will consider “all temporally-suspended activities” it had paused during its diplomacy with the Trump administration, in an apparent threat to resume testing of nuclear explosives and intercontinental ballistic missiles.

Pyongyang’s Foreign Ministry had earlier warned of “stronger and certain reaction” after the Biden administration imposed fresh sanctions following the North’s second hypersonic test on Jan. 11.

The U.S. Treasury Department imposed sanctions on five North Koreans over their roles in obtaining equipment and technology for the country’s missile programs, while the State Department ordered sanctions against another North Korean, a Russian man and a Russian company for their broader support of North Korea’s weapons activities.

However, Washington’s efforts to seek new U.N. Security Council sanctions against the five North Koreans sanctioned by the Treasury Department were blocked last week by China and Russia, which have called for the U.N. to end key sanctions against the North, citing its economic difficulties.

“Despite efforts to strengthen sanctions, Washington’s responses to North Korean launches this month are nowhere near its reaction to Pyongyang’s provocations in 2017,” when the North staged an unusually provocative run in nuclear and ICBM tests, said Leif-Eric Easley, a professor at Ewha University in Seoul.

“U.S. policy has become more measured and coordinated but is still inadequate for changing North Korean behavior. The Biden administration has other priorities, ranging from pandemic recovery at home to confronting Russia over Ukraine, Iran regarding its nuclear program, and China across the board,” he said.

Despite international concerns over its weapons activity, North Korea will still get to chair a U.N. disarmament forum during a one-month presidency between May 30 to June 24, according to a U.N. statement.

The U.N. Conference on Disarmament, which has 65 member states and focuses on nuclear disarmament issues, says the conference’s presidency rotates among member states.

U.N. Watch, a Geneva-based activist group, called for the U.S. and European ambassadors to walk out of the conference during North Korea’s presidency, saying that the country threatens to attack other U.N. member states with missiles and commits atrocities against its own people.

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AP writer Mari Yamaguchi in Tokyo contributed to this report.