
China sows disinformation on Hong Kong using porn accounts on Twitter - hardmaru
https://qz.com/1700550/china-sows-hong-kong-disinformation-using-twitter-porn-accounts/
======
duguxu
Just some personal observations, maybe relevant to recent misinformation
topics, or maybe not.

Facebook, Twitter, Instagram etc. are all blocked in mainland China. Many
people, especially those young and well-educated, use VPN to access them, have
an account and follow world news and foreign celebrities sometimes.

There are popular and feature-rich counterparts in mainland, and most people
prefer to have their daily sharing and discussion (including domestic
politics) there instead of on social media based in US. Therefore most of the
time, their accounts on Facebook or Twitter are mainly for reading rather than
sharing and posting.

However, they might comment (register a new account if needed) on topics
conveying a message related to China they strongly disagree (you could argue
they are brainwashed), in a short period and coordinated way (they read repost
from the same domestic website), through a few common IP addresses (the same
VPN), with bad-written English (seldom practice writing before). But they are
not bots and it's inappropriate to label these as the typical state-run
misinformation campaign.

If you speak Chinese, you could find many discussions where ordinary people
complain their accounts get blocked because of pro-China comments. e.g.
[https://weibo.com/1401527553/I32ryx2cu](https://weibo.com/1401527553/I32ryx2cu)

Of course, these observations aren't necessarily contradictory with recent
reports blaming China propaganda. I just want to show how some false
positivity could happen, since there's some difference of the behaviour of
China's users. Maybe a better algorithm is needed to distinguish them from
government-backed activities.

~~~
LorenPechtel
Another factor here--China pushes a lot of propaganda domestically. Some of
these tweets might be mindless repetition of the propaganda.

On the other hand, how many of those "ordinary people" are really part of the
operation and simply complaining to create doubt?

~~~
vkou
Some? Given how much blatant propaganda I see in my Facebook feed, from very
clearly real people, who very clearly believe the garbage they spew, I would
say that the correct answer is most.

There's no shortage of people who will happily repeat the most inane,
counterfactual political rhetoric. Don't assume they are paid shills, bots, or
foreign spies.

~~~
jacquesm
'Useful idiots'.

------
sidthekid
I've seen something similar in some extremist bot accounts, where the tweet
picture and text has a titillating and sexual tone (like catfishing) but
includes an unrelated political hashtag at the end. These bots try to get
certain hashtags trending without the users who fav the tweets realizing that.

------
dirtyid
Full report:

[https://www.aspi.org.au/report/tweeting-through-great-
firewa...](https://www.aspi.org.au/report/tweeting-through-great-firewall)

>Researchers from the International Cyber Policy Centre (ICPC) at the
Australian Strategic Policy Institute have conducted a preliminary analysis of
the dataset. Our research indicates that the information operation targeted at
the protests appears to have been a relatively small and hastily assembled
operation rather than a sophisticated information campaign planned well in
advance.

>However, our research has also found that the accounts included in the
information operation identified by Twitter were active in earlier information
operations targeting political opponents of the Chinese government, including
an exiled billionaire, a human rights lawyer, a bookseller and protestors in
mainland China. The earliest of these operations date back to April 2017.

>This is significant because—if the attribution to state-backed actors made by
Twitter is correct—it indicates that actors linked to the Chinese government
may have been running covert information operations on Western social media
platforms for at least two years.

>Research limitations: ICPC does not have access to the relevant data to
independently verify that these accounts are linked to the Chinese government;
this research proceeds on the assumption that Twitter’s attribution is
correct. It is also important to note that Twitter has not released the
methodology by which this dataset was selected, and the dataset may not
represent a complete picture of Chinese state-linked information operations on
Twitter.

Chinese foreign propaganda has been typically bad, but it's a little wild it's
still this bad especially after two years. Almost makes attribution harder to
believe.

~~~
b_tterc_p
This jumped out at me too. It’s pretty garbage, but it may be that garbage
works

~~~
dirtyid
The data set relevant to HK comprised of 112 accounts and 1600 tweets, only
significantly active during mid June to mid July before activity stopped.

[https://s3-ap-southeast-2.amazonaws.com/ad-
aspi/2019-09/chiT...](https://s3-ap-southeast-2.amazonaws.com/ad-
aspi/2019-09/chiTweet_HK_tweets_per_day.png)?

Very anemic effort, but I think Twitter also proactively suspended 200,000
accounts as well. The operation probably pivoted following the crackdown.
Still it's a little difficult reconciling how low effort this is with the
Chinese influence everywhere narrative.

>The ICPC’s preliminary research indicates that the information operation
targeting the Hong Kong protests, as reflected in this dataset, was relatively
small hastily constructed, and relatively unsophisticated. This suggests that
the operation, which Twitter has identified as linked to state-backed actors,
is likely to have been a rapid response to the unanticipated size and power of
the Hong Kong protests rather than a campaign planned well in advance. The
unsophisticated nature of the campaign suggests a crude understanding of
information operations and rudimentary tradecraft that is a long way from the
skill level demonstrated by other state actors. This may be because the
campaigns were outsourced to a contractor, or may reflect a lack of
familiarity on the part of Chinese state-backed actors when it comes to
information operations on open social media platforms such as Twitter, as
opposed to the highly proficient levels of control demonstrated by the Chinese
government over heavily censored platforms such as WeChat or Weibo.

I'm really curious how Twitter attributed the campaign was state backed,
something Facebook and Google did not claim. Were these accounts transparently
VPNing from the mainland or was there something more sophisticated happening.

------
lallysingh
Sounds like a classic lowest-bidder government contractor situation. "Sure, we
have 100,000 accounts, and we'll charge 1.25 RMB per tweet per account."
"Fantastic! You get the contract!" "Oh shit we need to find 100,000 accounts
fast and cheap."

~~~
taneq
"I met this girl on the internet, she said she'd do anything for 1.25 RMB.
Anything? Really?! ...So I got her to post tweets supporting the Chinese
government."

~~~
tossAfterUsing
It's china... the rates are actually less than half that (5 Jiao, where 10Jiao
= 1Yuan)

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/50_Cent_Party](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/50_Cent_Party)

here's some images for folks who like pictures:
[http://www.chinatoday.com/fin/mon/](http://www.chinatoday.com/fin/mon/)

------
s_Hogg
I've seen a few of these, they appear in the replies to threads created by BBC
journos saying things like (in translation): "support the central government"

These accounts were pretty perplexing until this article spelled out what
should have been obvious to me.

~~~
alfromspace
Who's being convinced by statements like that?

~~~
delecti
It's not really an argument, but it could make people think they're more of an
outlier in doubting the government. Once you doubt your convictions you might
start to reconsider the arguments you've already been exposed to.

~~~
bouncycastle
Indeed. This is known as "Gaslighting".

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gaslighting](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gaslighting)

------
FreeHugs
I don't understand it.

So there are bots that have been posting "porn" for a bunch of years. And now
they post political messages.

How does that influence anybody? Who subscribes to porn bots? I would have
thought only other porn bots follow porn bots?

Can somebody link to an example of such a bot?

~~~
simias
>Who subscribes to porn bots? I would have thought only other porn bots follow
porn bots?

Clearly if they exist they must have some marginal use. It's like saying "who
falls for nigerian prince scams?" or "who is influenced by ads?". Clearly some
people are, otherwise they wouldn't be quite as popular. I'm sure some real
people follow porn bots in order to... see porn.

As for the influence I think in isolation it's probably negligible, but if
people get flooded by propaganda on social networks it may be quite efficient.
"Everybody says it, it can't be completely wrong". The echo-chamber nature of
many social networks probably plays into that too. Many people would probably
be more likely to follow an obvious bot spamming propaganda that aligns with
their beliefs than a real person holding a different opinion. For instance an
obviously biased propaganda outlet like Prager U has 2 million followers on
Youtube, I doubt all of those are bots.

~~~
lonelappde
PragerU isn't obvious to most people that's what's insidious about it. It's a
fake "university" for people who are too ignorant or low intelligent to know
what a real one looks like. Compare PragerU to "A People's History of the
United States" book. Both are highly politically biased, both oppose
"mainstream" education, but one is intellectually much better than the other.
Discerning which requires higher level thinking many people lack.

~~~
simias
I think you're wrong to assume that it only works with people who are "too
ignorant or low intelligent". Confirmation bias is not limited to dumb people.
It's always more pleasant and comforting to listen to people agreeing with you
(even if what they're saying isn't super insightful) rather than people
arguing against your values (even if what they're saying is very interesting).

Searching for contradictory viewpoints and actually managing to listen to the
argument with an open mind takes effort. That's the big problem with most
social media currently, they amplify this bias to the extreme. You can hold a
fringe belief like "earth is flat" and still manage to find thousand of people
agreeing with you, spending hours every day consuming flat earth content and
avoiding any dissenting voice.

------
dredmorbius
The irony here seems to be that the Chinese government seems to have
discovered (or long known and recently harnessed) the power of celebrity
culture for advertising.

George Monbiot on that theme (outside China) recently:

[https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2016/dec/20/celebr...](https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2016/dec/20/celebrity-
corporate-machine-fame-big-business-donald-trump-kim-kardashian)

As for the lack of sophistication: we tend to presume evil super-geniuses.
What in fact makes for audacious acts (evil or otherwise) is _disinhibition_.
The ability to act with immunity or impunity, or acting without regard or
knowledge for possible consequences, is what tends to distinguish normal from
both evil and heroic acts. When doing evil, the consequence is harm done to
others, heroism and bravery are disregard to help others.

Ignorance, ideology, and legal shields are all forms of providing that
immunity or impunity.

------
vectorEQ
more alarming news is that people still let tweets form their opinion on
public matters.

~~~
Nasrudith
I must disagree slightly. It is a sensible let tweets influence opinion in the
sense of "what do many think about it?". Also to some minute degree it shapes
just from "normalization" as it turns "unheard of idea" to "commonly proposed
idea". Said ideas could still be horrible and foolish but they get more
attention but it isn't viewed as bizzare, horrible, and foolish anymore.

Of course people should also apply enough critical thinking to realize when
the norm is utterly messed up, the masses are being a bunch of idiots or it
starts to look very astroturfy.

------
blondie9x
Come on China. Let Hong Kong be free. Let them vote and let them choose their
government. 讓他們選他們自己的政府。

------
totaldude87
With all that happening in Hong Kong, i wonder why UK and US are not at all
involved?

~~~
throwawaywego
It is very meta to ask this question, and to see the replies to this question,
as the trope: "The US meddles in foreign revolutions" is common for (social)
media propaganda (bots).

> Claim: The US is supporting and encouraging Hong Kong protests.

> Verdict: Conspiracy theory without evidence.

> For years, pro-Kremlin media has used the narrative about anti-government
> protests being funded by the US. Examples include colour revolutions in
> post-soviet states, the “Arab Spring” revolts, and Euromaidan in 2014.

> The Hong Kong protests began in June 2019 because of a controversial
> extradition law that would allow for the transfer of suspects to face trial
> on the Chinese mainland.

[https://euvsdisinfo.eu/report/the-us-is-supporting-and-
encou...](https://euvsdisinfo.eu/report/the-us-is-supporting-and-encouraging-
hong-kong-protests/)

~~~
guerrilla
It's a matter of probability. They are so often involved [1] that they get
blamed even when they appear not to be involved. That's especially true when
people know that they have incentives for being involved, regardless of
whether or not they are actually involved.

[1]
[https://github.com/dessalines/essays/blob/master/us_atrociti...](https://github.com/dessalines/essays/blob/master/us_atrocities.md)

~~~
throwawaywego
Stating "The US is funding the Hong Kong protests" may very well be found true
later on, but right now, it is a conspiracy theory without any evidence, not a
matter of probability based on arbitrary priors. This conspiracy theory is
actively used in online propaganda with an aim to erode trust in the US,
playing on plausible blame and prejudice. It is a distraction tactic, where
two wrongs somehow make a right, or make us feel better about the dangerous
road taken, because we conclude that nowhere is safe.

Really no better than: "Let's discuss: Employee China stole something from the
communal fridge." "Sure, but what about Employee US? I judged him stealing
last year. I assume it very probable that Employee US is stealing from
Employee China right now. Maybe that's why Employee China was so hungry, he
was forced to steal, because Employee US started it. Maybe Employee China did
not even steal anything, just took the blame for an unredeemable thief. Let's
discuss and pontificate about that hypothetical instead!"

~~~
guerrilla
> "The US is funding the Hong Kong protests"

This wasn't the claim, so please don't quote it as it were. That's not a
quotation from anyone here.

> later on

That's not how induction works. What we're doing is making a prediction. When
we observe that something happens with a certain frequency, we judge that the
probability of it occuring in the future is proportional to that frequency.
I'm not saying the US is involved in HK. I'm saying it's justified to conclude
that the US probably is involved in HK (and to be explicit: this is not
equivalent to saying that the US did or did not cause HK.) People do not wait
for an object to fall before they make their prediction and that's because we
have sufficient historical data as well as explanatory theories to support our
expecations.

> without any evidence

The evience is the history of the US's behavior and their current incentives
to do so.

> arbitrary priors

The priors are not arbitrary. They are consistent and theoretically accounted
for by several branches of IR theory.

> conspiracy theory

Geopolitical neorealism, for example, is not a conspiracy theory, it's one of
the leading schools of thought in IR theory at the moment.

> propaganda with an aim to erode trust in the US

What "erodes trust" in the US is the US's behavior, not pointing out facts
about it.

> stealing last year.

We're not talking about one incident. We're talking about an extensively
documented history amounting to a consistent pattern of behavior which is
trivially explainable using mainstream IR theory.

Nobody is denying what China does. To point out additional facts is not to
contradict any other facts.

~~~
throwawaywego
It is a restate of the conspiratorial claim in my first post. One is justified
to say anything one pleases, but it could still be a detraction or pointless
speculation: "News flash: Alice Zhang has long hair. Women frequently have
long hair. But, Bobby Joe is a surfer dude, and surfer dudes like long hair
and frequently have long hair too. I haven't seen Bobby yet, or saw a photo of
him, but I relevantly pose that I am justified in saying -- using my a priori
knowledge of surfer dudes -- that Bobby, a man, likely has long hair too. My
evidence is that Bobby, being a surfer dude, has an incentive to like long
hair. I am not contradicting that Alice does not have long hair, just
complementing the discussion with extensively documented history of surfer
dudes and the likelihood of Bobby's hair length."

~~~
guerrilla
> One is justified to say anything one pleases

One is not justified in belieiving anything one pleases. There are things
which are justified and things which are not and a coherent epistemology
distinguishes between the two.

~~~
elefanten
Can you describe your coherent epistemology? The one that leads you to believe
a throughly context-free, slapdash list of low-quality wiki text spanning
hundreds of topics over hundreds of years counts as a citable piece of
evidence for... anything really?

~~~
guerrilla
> that leads you to believe

It doesn't. It's just a summary, akin to a comment.

> evidence for

It wasn't intended to be evidnence for anything but a reminder of the pattern
of behavior that the US is throughoughly documented (elsewhere) to have
engaged in over the years.

------
linyu0219
me one of them

