[ad_1]
Tony Romm
Writer dealing with technology policy
A few months after President Trump came to power, Russian disinformation teams headed for a new target: the special advocate Robert S. Mueller. III. After striving to help Trump get into the White House, they were now striving to neutralize the biggest threat hanging over him.
Russian agents landed on Mueller through fake accounts on Facebook, Twitter and beyond, mistakenly asserting that the former director of the FBI was corrupt and that the allegations of interference from the Russia in the 2016 election were phantasmagorical plots. An article on Instagram – which has emerged as a particularly powerful weapon in the arsenal of Russian social media – claimed that Mueller had worked in the past with "radical Islamist groups".
These tactics showed how Russian teams were moving agile on social media platforms for a clever online influence operation targeting American voters. The effort began earlier than expected and lasted longer, while building on the strengths of different sites to manipulate distinct slices of the electorate, according to a pair of new detailed reports prepared for the Senate Intelligence Committee and released Monday.
The reports, written by Oxford University's computer propaganda project and the graphika network analysis company, were made public when the Washington Post obtained them and have them. published the highlights on Sunday. The other report was published by social media research firm New Knowledge, Columbia University and Canfield Research.
Together, the reports describe the Russian campaign with a breath and details until then unknown. Researchers analyzed more than 10 million posts and posts on all major social media platforms to understand how the Russians used US technology to create a sprawling online misinformation machine, with each element playing a specific role. supporting others with links and other connections. 19659008] Reports also highlight the difficulty of overcoming Russian misinformation, as agents move easily from one platform to another, making the process of detecting and suppressing deceptive publications unmanageable. by any company.
Twitter has hit political and journalistic elites. Facebook and its advertising targeting tools have divided the electorate into demographic and ideal segments ready to be manipulated, with the focus being on strengthening the conservatives and suppressing African Americans, traditionally more likely to vote for the democrats.
YouTube has provided a free online library of more than 1,100 videos of misinformation. PayPal helped raise funds and deliver political-themed wares designed by Russian teams, such as "I SUPPORT AMERICAN LAW ENWICHING" t-shirts. Tumblr, Medium, Vine, Reddit and various other websites also played a role.
"We hope that these reports will enlighten the American people and decision makers, while spelling out the scale of the operation and the long game played," said Renee DiResta, research director at New Knowledge.
Social media researchers said the militarization of these sites and services was highlighting the growing challenge they faced in fighting the increasingly sophisticated tactics of Russia and other foreign criminals in line.
"Some of the platforms that have less traffic, but still have very engaged communities, are the most vulnerable to a problem like misinformation," said Graham Brookie, head of the Digital Forensic Research Lab of the United States. Atlantic Council. "They do not have the resources to make their platforms more resilient."
One of the unexpected stars of Monday's new reporting is Facebook's photo sharing subsidiary, Instagram. Over the years of the misinformation campaign, Instagram has generated unparalleled responses – with 187 million comments, likes and comments from other users, more than Twitter and Facebook combined.
But it was the least scrutinized of other lawmakers, researchers and journalists focused more on Facebook, Twitter and Google. The researchers found that the use of Instagram by Russian teams had more than doubled in the first six months following Trump's election. It also offered access to a younger population and offered simple tastes in a simple and engaging format.
"What Instagram likes, is where are the kids and that's what seems to be the place where the Russians went," said Philip N. Howard, director of Oxford Research Group
The New Knowledge-based report found that Russians had posted 116,000 times on Instagram, nearly double the number of times on Facebook, as reported in the report. The most popular publications have praised African-American culture and achievements, but the Russians have also targeted this community with voter repression messages broadcast on multiple platforms, calling for a boycott of the election or broadcasting false information about the vote.
On Monday, the NAACP called for a week-long boycott of Facebook starting on Tuesday, saying the company's business practices – and spreading "misleading representations of the African-American community" on its site – should pave the way for a congressional inquiry.
In a statement, Facebook said it had "made progress in preventing interference on our platforms during the elections, strengthened our anti-voter suppression policy before the mid-term of 2018, and funded independent research on the issue." The impact of social media on democracy ".
Reddit and Medium did not immediately respond to requests for comment. Tumblr pointed to an article published on a blog in November, which indicated that the company had eliminated Russia-related misinformation before this year's elections. PayPal stated that it "was working to fight against and prevent the unlawful use of our services". Twitter said it has made "significant progress since 2016 to counter the manipulation of our service."
The emergence of Mueller as an important target also highlights the adaptability of the Russian campaign. In May 2017, he was appointed special advisor to investigate allegations of Russian influence on the Trump campaign. As such, he criminally charged a troll farm linked to the Kremlin called the Internet Research Agency and other people affiliated with the disinformation campaign.
A research team from Clemson University, unaffiliated with one of the reports published on Monday, discovered that Russians have tweeted about Mueller over 5,000 times, including retweets published for the first time by others. Some called for his dismissal, others mocked him as incompetent and still others campaigned for the end of "his false investigation".
New Knowledge's report highlighted the focus on Mueller and dismissed FBI director James B. Comey, who
Russian agents often made jokes to undermine investigations into their misinformation campaign, have discovered the researchers. One of them showed Democrat Hillary Clinton: "Everyone I do not like, it's a Russian hacker." Another showed a woman in a talking car to a police officer with the caption: "This is not my officer responsible for the fault, the Russians have looted my speed. "
At one point, shortly after the 2016 elections, Russian agents also began to make fun of Facebook's general manager, Mark Zuckerberg, for claiming that social media did not have anything to do with it. impact on Trump's victory – an assertion for which he later apologized. .
On Capitol Hill, senior Democrats said Monday that the revelations contained in both Senate reports highlighted the need to study social media and consider new regulations to prevent Russia and other foreign actors to manipulate American democracy in future elections. 19659027] "I think that all the platforms remain extremely vulnerable, and I do not have the confidence of the companies but the companies have invested the resources and the human power necessary to face the scale of the problem "Adam B. Schiff (D-Calif.), The new chairman of the House's Intelligence Committee
said that the revelations on Instagram were" surprising ", going against data and testimonies. previously provided by Facebook to the commission. . "If Facebook was not aware of it, it's a problem," he said. "If they were aware and did not share this information, the problem would be completely different."
Sen. Richard Burr (RN.C.), chair of the committee that asked researchers to analyze data from technology companies, said the results show "how aggressively Russia was trying to divide Americans into function of race, religion and ideology ".
Another GOP legislator on the Senate Intelligence Committee declined to comment or did not respond.
Facebook leaders barely spoke of Instagram's role when they testified before Congress late last year about Russia's interference. At the time, the company said that the Russian campaign had reached 126 million people on Facebook and 20 million on Instagram.
[ad_2]
Source link
