Tell MAMA was launched[1] on 21 February 2012 by Eric Pickles MP, Secretary of State for the Department for Communities and Local Government and is co-ordinated by the interfaith organisation Faith Matters.

[2] Faith Matters was founded by social entrepreneur Fiyaz Mughal OBE, a former adviser to the Leader of the Liberal Democrats, Nick Clegg, on Interfaith and Preventing Radicalisation and Extremism.

[22] Of physical incidents reported in its first year, Tell MAMA founder Fiyaz Mughal said on BBC Sunday Morning Live that 70% were perpetrated against hijab or niqab-wearing women and the majority of attackers were white males, aged 20–50.

This was the case following the Charlie Hebdo attack, where Tell MAMA reported on issues such as mosques receiving death threats,[33] and the rise of school-based anti-Muslim hate incidents in the aftermath.

[35] Former Hizb ut-Tahrir member, and now Senior Fellow at ICSR, King's College London, Shiraz Maher wrote in The Jewish Chronicle that: Tell Mama is new and, though gauche in many respects, it is badly needed.

[36]Support has ranged from British Muslims for Secular Democracy[37] through to the Council of Mosques in Calderdale where Tell MAMA was launched in West Yorkshire.

[42] Gilligan wrote that the group's government funding was axed following concerns about its methods raised by Don Foster, the Minister for Communities.

Gilligan's report said that the decision was made before the Woolwich attack and was based on perceived discrepancies between the group’s statistics and ACPO and police records.

[41] Tell MAMA responded to Gilligan's criticism by stating that online attacks were worth recording and had links to real-world incidents and wider communal tensions.

[47] Government advisor and academic expert on Islamophobia, Dr Chris Allen, suggested that there was likely to be significant under-reporting of anti-Muslim incidents, based on a large 2009 EU-wide survey.

[51] Charles Moore, also writing in The Daily Telegraph in June 2013, followed Gilligan's report by stating:[52] Writing in the New Statesman magazine, academic Matthew Goodwin, of Nottingham University, an expert on British far-right politics, criticised Charles Moore and Andrew Gilligan, who he said were "proved wrong" in trying to "dismiss a documented rise in attacks against Muslims following the [Woolwich] attack."

Goodwin went on to say: Criticising the approaches of Gilligan and Moore, senior Labour frontbench MP Sadiq Khan, said: Khan's words were echoed by deputy head of the Conservative Muslim Forum and Tell MAMA patron, Mohammed Amin, writing on the prominent Conservative Party blog, ConservativeHome: A Liberty GB radio host, Tim Burton, was arrested, charged and prosecuted for comments he tweeted about Tell MAMA founder Fiyaz Mughal in the wake of the Islamophobia reporting controversy.

[citation needed] Patrons of the Tell MAMA project include Jonathan Bloch, the Reverend Mark Oakley, John Esposito, Canon Dr. Giles Fraser and Lord Sheikh of Cornhill.