Although social networks were once the cause of the rise of opposition protest voices in the Middle East, in what is described as the "Twitter uprising" or "Facebook revolution" - it is now a tool that has potential relevance to the formulation of world public opinion and the impact of elections of all kinds, Including those that brought Donald Trump to the White House, until he became described as " the first American President of Facebook ."
According to two recent reports from the Oxford Institute for Internet and Independent Research, Newsweek has shown the secret ways some states and political actors on social networking sites use to manipulate public opinion around the world. Six illustrative examples were highlighted: the United States, Azerbaijan, Israel, China, Russia and the United Kingdom.
In fact, the two reports reveal how "cyberspace" - the name the Oxford Internet Institute launched on this new political force - was simply a means employed by states, armies and parties to ensure their survival in power and to eliminate dissidents by mixing public funding and contracts And use of bots or phantom accounts to produce at least 1,000 publications a day via social networking sites, according to Newsweek .
By creating an imaginary support for an idea or a candidate, the bots aim to attract actual support by stirring the crowd's influence; to show that accepting an idea or person seems natural and palatable. According to Philip Howard, of the Oxford Internet Institute, "If you use enough bots and people, then connect them intelligently, they will carry legitimacy and create the truth." This is why consensus across social networks is in the interest of those who have the most powerful resource package.
According to two recent reports from the Oxford Institute for Internet and Independent Research, Newsweek has shown the secret ways some states and political actors on social networking sites use to manipulate public opinion around the world. Six illustrative examples were highlighted: the United States, Azerbaijan, Israel, China, Russia and the United Kingdom.
In fact, the two reports reveal how "cyberspace" - the name the Oxford Internet Institute launched on this new political force - was simply a means employed by states, armies and parties to ensure their survival in power and to eliminate dissidents by mixing public funding and contracts And use of bots or phantom accounts to produce at least 1,000 publications a day via social networking sites, according to Newsweek .
By creating an imaginary support for an idea or a candidate, the bots aim to attract actual support by stirring the crowd's influence; to show that accepting an idea or person seems natural and palatable. According to Philip Howard, of the Oxford Internet Institute, "If you use enough bots and people, then connect them intelligently, they will carry legitimacy and create the truth." This is why consensus across social networks is in the interest of those who have the most powerful resource package.
United States: The Rise of Bots
In a report on social network manipulation, the Oxford Internet Institute described the fierce 2016 campaign between Trump and Hillary as "the breaking point" when social networking was "at the highest level during the entire campaign."
During the election campaign, many forces were reported to have manipulated public opinion. Hundreds of thousands of bots and some right-wing sites, such as Bright Bart, have published novels urging the band and the diaspora. In the state of Michigan, for example, in the days leading up to the election, there was a large-scale exchange of false news, which was said to be from the professional press. At the same time, companies such as Cambridge Analytics, which has described itself as an "election management" specialist, worked for Trump, especially via Facebook, to attract reluctant voters.
As her campaign progressed, Hillary Clinton campaigned for some of these tactics, with large-scale data and pro-bots, but Trump proved to be the most effective. At the key moments of the campaign, Trump's potions produced more than five times the effectiveness of Hillary Clinton's campaign.
As for Twitter, which often has no followers, they copy each other's messages, send ads with political content, and regularly republish the comments of Dan Skavino, social networking director of the Trump campaign.
In a related matter, a senior Republican official at the Oxford Internet Institute said social media campaigns were like those in the "old American West. This has already worked. A Harvard study concluded that Trump gets 15 percent more media coverage than Clinton.
In addition, the Declaration addressed to specific population groups focused mainly on Trump's strategy. Hillary Clinton spent two and a half times more than Trump on TV ads and was involved in 73 per cent of digital advertising nationwide.
In recent months, the Trump team, led by Cambridge Analytica, has focused on subgroups. One of the most famous examples was a statement against Clinton that echoed her infamous 1996 speech calling the so-called "big predators" to influence black voters across Facebook in areas where Republicans had hoped to overthrow the Democrats. Other.
In fact, the parent company of Cambridge Analytica in Britain, called "Strategic Communications Labs", has served the government for years and works with the US Department of Defense. The Washington Post reported"Says she has been working with the State Department for a long time, and there is also increased caution about hundreds of thousands of bots," Sleeping Bots, "accounts that have once published a tweet or two Trump tweets, The right political moment for disseminating disinformation and obscuring the opposition's views. "
In this regard, Emilio Ferrara, associate professor of computer science at the University of Southern California, points to the possibility of a" black market of reusable disinformation bots " Whenever they are needed It seems that some reports confirm these concerns, that the same bots that were used to support Trump, also used against Emmanuel McCron, winner of the French presidential elections this year.
During the election campaign, many forces were reported to have manipulated public opinion. Hundreds of thousands of bots and some right-wing sites, such as Bright Bart, have published novels urging the band and the diaspora. In the state of Michigan, for example, in the days leading up to the election, there was a large-scale exchange of false news, which was said to be from the professional press. At the same time, companies such as Cambridge Analytics, which has described itself as an "election management" specialist, worked for Trump, especially via Facebook, to attract reluctant voters.
As her campaign progressed, Hillary Clinton campaigned for some of these tactics, with large-scale data and pro-bots, but Trump proved to be the most effective. At the key moments of the campaign, Trump's potions produced more than five times the effectiveness of Hillary Clinton's campaign.
As for Twitter, which often has no followers, they copy each other's messages, send ads with political content, and regularly republish the comments of Dan Skavino, social networking director of the Trump campaign.
In a related matter, a senior Republican official at the Oxford Internet Institute said social media campaigns were like those in the "old American West. This has already worked. A Harvard study concluded that Trump gets 15 percent more media coverage than Clinton.
In addition, the Declaration addressed to specific population groups focused mainly on Trump's strategy. Hillary Clinton spent two and a half times more than Trump on TV ads and was involved in 73 per cent of digital advertising nationwide.
In recent months, the Trump team, led by Cambridge Analytica, has focused on subgroups. One of the most famous examples was a statement against Clinton that echoed her infamous 1996 speech calling the so-called "big predators" to influence black voters across Facebook in areas where Republicans had hoped to overthrow the Democrats. Other.
In fact, the parent company of Cambridge Analytica in Britain, called "Strategic Communications Labs", has served the government for years and works with the US Department of Defense. The Washington Post reported"Says she has been working with the State Department for a long time, and there is also increased caution about hundreds of thousands of bots," Sleeping Bots, "accounts that have once published a tweet or two Trump tweets, The right political moment for disseminating disinformation and obscuring the opposition's views. "
In this regard, Emilio Ferrara, associate professor of computer science at the University of Southern California, points to the possibility of a" black market of reusable disinformation bots " Whenever they are needed It seems that some reports confirm these concerns, that the same bots that were used to support Trump, also used against Emmanuel McCron, winner of the French presidential elections this year.
China: Party "50 cents"
China is probably home to the country 's first- ever network-wide manipulation, with a vast network of about 2 million people promoting the party's popular line, the 50-cent Party. The label refers to allegations that members of the party received half a Chinese yuan for each publication.
"The government falsifies and publishes about 448 million comments on social networking sites every year," a study by Harvard University estimated. Of the 43,800 system-supported publications analyzed, 99.3 per cent were shared by one of the top 200 government agencies. Instead of catching opponents or spreading misleading information, Beijing uses its own troll army to divert public attention during key political moments. One classic tactic is to spread emotional or unrealistic comments in order to redirect citizens' anger toward the user they publish and divert attention from the issue as such.
On this issue, Professor Jennifer Ban, one of the academics involved in the Harvard study, told Newsweek, "They are trying to reorient public attention by producing positive content, which we call encouraging publications, while it is expected Organized a protest or a party meeting in. During these periods, a coordinated explosion of activity emerges that can block the basic discussions that take place on the Internet. "
In general, China's social networking strategies come primarily from Taiwan, which China claims is part of its territory. Shortly after her election in 2016, Taiwanese President Tsai Ing-wen received a barrage of comments on her Facebook page warning the island of independence. It turned out that many of these hostile comments were sent from China, where both Facebook and Twitter were banned, indicating that the process could only be approved by the government.
In fact, just as the Facebook and Twitter ban shows, China's Internet-based fist is more than hiring trolls, as it also has the most notorious censorship of the Internet, China's Great Firewall. The barrier blocks foreign news outlets, Internet tools (such as Google search) and smart phone applications.
Israel: A high-tech battle for high ethics
With more than 350 official government accounts on social networking sites, Israel has one of the most professional online operations in the world. These accounts cover a full range of platforms on the Internet, from Twitter to Instagram, and are based on 3 languages: Hebrew, Arabic and English.
Volunteer students make up the bulk of the State of Israel's presence on the Internet, with outstanding students often awarded scholarships as a reward for their work. Contrary to what is happening in Azerbaijan and China, the strategy adopted is to engage in the debate and to strengthen or support the government's authority in an optimistic tone to assert Israeli liberalism vis-a-vis its neighbors.
Accordingly, participation in the comment section on websites, online forums and social networking sites is aimed at improving Israel's position both at home and abroad.
"We will get reliable information and make sure that it is widely disseminated, and we will not leave the negative stories on the web without a response and we will publish messages," said another official involved in the operation, launched in August 2013, to the Jerusalem Post. Positive, what we are doing is considered revolutionary. "
Russia: Trolling Factories
In early 2003, there were allegations that Russian propagandists were secretly entering chat rooms. However, after a series of leaks in 2013 and 2014, the full volume of the ongoing Russian operation became clearer. "Russia is the case to consider how to use a particularly powerful authoritarian system, social networking sites to control people," said Sam Woley, a member of the Oxford University's Internet Propaganda Research Team.
The Internet Research Agency and Nashi are only two of the many organizations that train and pay trolls to attack Russian President Vladimir Putin's opponents inside and outside Russia. The fact that the former is a private company, and the second is a Kremlin-backed youth movement of 150,000 members, demonstrates the complexity of the Kremlin's strategy.
To achieve its goal, cyber forces are creating online personalities and running forums in the context of transforming propaganda into non-political reflections, but most of them are known for their aggressive persistence. They are targeting journalists and political opponents in the hope of being removed from the Internet or forced to remain silent. In this context, a Finnish investigative reporter who wrote about the Internet Research Agency's operation has become a victim of a vicious and frightening retaliatory campaign. Meanwhile, leaders of Nashi made lists of human rights activists a target, declaring them "the most vicious enemies".
According to the 2013 leaks, bloggers working for the Internet Research Agency should manage 6 accounts on Facebook and publish at least 3 publications a day. Those on Twitter should have at least 10 accounts and 50 tweets a day. In addition, these individuals have specific goals and are defined as subordinates, and a certain level of participation. They often work in so-called "trolling factories", ie, buildings or vaults, where hundreds of employees have these objectives. It is estimated that 45% of the activity on Twitter in Russia is managed by these accounts.
In general, the process is global, not only to defend Putin outside the country; it is also part of Russia's foreign policy objectives, which means that flawed English is a weak point for it. As a result, an investigation by Buzzfeed, an American network of Russian trolls, revealed the recruitment of English teachers by these organizations to teach cyber forces the correct grammar for their interaction with the Western public.
UK: Britain's exit from the EU and bots and massive data
The British exit referendum from the EU in 2016 also provided a strong overview of strategies for manipulating social networking sites. In the months leading up to the vote, almost a third of Twitter's data traffic was generated by automated bots, which were almost entirely in favor of Britain's exit from the EU.
It should be noted that the bots were not limited to the movement in favor of this exit only. Following the referendum, a petition on the Internet calling for a second referendum, attracted more than 3.7 million signatures in a week. While initially interpreted as a sign of voter turnout, it later emerged that the petition contained 42,000 signatures from the Vatican City (population of 800) and about 25,000 signatures from North Korea (where Internet access is very limited) .
In fact, people do not see the story as fictitious, for example, and believe it immediately, "said Professor Susan Banduche, a social scientist at Exeter University in Newsweek, Which is part of the process and in the meantime, major political parties are still adapting to this environment. "
People tend to believe what is common. The more they see a story or request, the more likely they will accept it the next time they see it. Apart from the referendum, the British government has adopted some of these tactics. In 2015, the British Army announced that its 77th Battalion would "focus on non-lethal psychological processes that use social networks such as Facebook and Twitter to fight enemies by controlling stories in the information age."
From this perspective, the aim of this battalion is to use "dynamic stories" to combat political propaganda published by terrorist organizations and to shape public opinion within this process. Edward Snowden's leaks in 2014 also revealed the existence of the Joint Threat Intelligence Research Group, which has been dedicated to fighting terrorism.
However, their tactics include "uploading video clips on YouTube containing persuasive messages, creating aliases on the Internet linked to accounts on Facebook and Twitter sites, blogs and forum memberships, as well as providing deceptive sources on the Internet."
With a clearer picture of these activities around the world, and the emergence of threats to an increasingly open society - the media tools that enable these players to do their jobs begin to lose their social color quickly.
It should be noted that the bots were not limited to the movement in favor of this exit only. Following the referendum, a petition on the Internet calling for a second referendum, attracted more than 3.7 million signatures in a week. While initially interpreted as a sign of voter turnout, it later emerged that the petition contained 42,000 signatures from the Vatican City (population of 800) and about 25,000 signatures from North Korea (where Internet access is very limited) .
In fact, people do not see the story as fictitious, for example, and believe it immediately, "said Professor Susan Banduche, a social scientist at Exeter University in Newsweek, Which is part of the process and in the meantime, major political parties are still adapting to this environment. "
People tend to believe what is common. The more they see a story or request, the more likely they will accept it the next time they see it. Apart from the referendum, the British government has adopted some of these tactics. In 2015, the British Army announced that its 77th Battalion would "focus on non-lethal psychological processes that use social networks such as Facebook and Twitter to fight enemies by controlling stories in the information age."
From this perspective, the aim of this battalion is to use "dynamic stories" to combat political propaganda published by terrorist organizations and to shape public opinion within this process. Edward Snowden's leaks in 2014 also revealed the existence of the Joint Threat Intelligence Research Group, which has been dedicated to fighting terrorism.
However, their tactics include "uploading video clips on YouTube containing persuasive messages, creating aliases on the Internet linked to accounts on Facebook and Twitter sites, blogs and forum memberships, as well as providing deceptive sources on the Internet."
With a clearer picture of these activities around the world, and the emergence of threats to an increasingly open society - the media tools that enable these players to do their jobs begin to lose their social color quickly.