
Information operations directed at Hong Kong - whatok
https://blog.twitter.com/en_us/topics/company/2019/information_operations_directed_at_Hong_Kong.html
======
tmux314
Good on Twitter and Facebook.

On top of blocking thousands of websites (which includes Facebook, Google,
Twitter) China's government employs thousands of government employees just to
purge even the most mild criticism of the CCP on Weibo [1]. They also employ
tens of thousands to export their propaganda overseas, using sock puppet
accounts to push their worldview[2]. And their worldview is fiercely anti-
democratic.

The Internet cannot remain free if we allow governments to use their power to
control narratives and suppress the truth. US-based Social media companies are
not ideal judges, but at least they publish their methodology and allow public
criticism of their platforms.

[1]
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sina_Weibo#Censorship](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sina_Weibo#Censorship)
[2]
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/50_Cent_Party](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/50_Cent_Party)

~~~
khawkins
>The Internet cannot remain free if we allow governments to use their power to
control narratives and suppress the truth.

I wish more people applied this same line of reasoning towards the US-based
social media companies themselves.

If we hold true that Twitter's influence is so powerful that world superpowers
are gaming it effectively to control narratives, then why aren't people more
outraged at the near constant censoring of alternative voices in the West? Why
are we cheering the use of corporate power when it's wielded against an
ideological opponent in the East, but when it's wielded against ideological
opponents in the West we hear a chorus of "it's a private company, it can do
what it wants". Ultimately, we're just rejecting communist state-power with
corporatist private-power.

I can agree that the latter is preferable, but I wish people would see the
parallels.

~~~
Solvitieg
The hive mind refuses to engage with hard-hitting analysis like this. Hence
the down votes and no responses.

Outside of this scope, what is concerning me is that you can't hold a pro-
china position. Look at the other comments here.

> I have some friends in China posting similar anti-protest posts on WeChat
> social media. It's like the news they read has a completely different story
> than what it's being told in legitimate new sources.

Holding a pro-china position apparently means you're reading fake news or part
of a misinformation campaign.

The news we read is CORRECT, the news you read is WRONG.

We have the same problem here in the West. If you go against the church of
progressivem you're a Russianbot.

Twitter needs to not get involved. It's election meddling, even if they take
the "pro-democratic" side.

~~~
meowface
It's not election meddling. It's counter-meddling. Counter-meddling is itself
kind of a form of meddling, but you're left with no choice if your platform is
in the process of being deceitfully meddled with by one of the most powerful
states in human history.

------
ryanchankh
HongKonger here. I have some friends in China posting similar anti-protest
posts on WeChat social media. It's like the news they read has a completely
different story than what it's being told in legitimate new sources. The
problem of fake news does become very apparent, and I hope people in China can
eventually gain awareness or at least start to question the validity of their
news sources.

~~~
ospider
Native Chinese here. Hacker news have been a great place to learn new things
to me for 5 years. But the political views on Hacker news are somewhat naive
to me. It seems that the Chinese Government is always evil and wrong, but why
haven't the government collapsed after so many years if there were no people
supporting them?

People in China, at least those millions people who are able to cross the
Great Firewall, know that democracy is generally good, but they also know that
a strong central government can also be useful for certain circumstances. Most
westerners and HongKongers on Hacker news have a very extreme political view,
you just believe "democracy is good"(TM), protesting against the evil Chinese
government is good. But can you take a closer look at what is really happening
in HK and then decide what you believe?

BTW, I'm neither pro-protester nor pro-police, I think the protest is a result
of economic regression in HK. You could also check my comment and posting
history to see that I'm not a 五毛党.

~~~
Arn_Thor
IMO the CCP gets its legitimacy to govern from its performance in some key
areas: economic development and stability/security. That plays to the party's
strengths, so the state-controlled media has actively promoted the view that
these factors are the most important. Note how issues like the environment and
health care were very much put on the back burner until public awareness and
criticism reached a critical threshold, after which the party acknowledged the
issues. So it's no surprise that the CCP enjoys a broad level of support on
the mainland—it has performed well in the key areas it has convinced people
matters most.

In a liberal democracy, on the other hand, people expect much more
responsiveness to their concerns. And people tend to value freedom of
expression and freedom from suppression. Those values are treasured in Hong
Kong.

So no wonder mainlanders and HKers have different outlooks on this issue.

~~~
luckylion
> the state-controlled media has actively promoted the view that these factors
> are the most important

Or those are the most important factors and that's why they are optimizing for
them first. Carville's slogan for Bill Clinton was "It's the economy, stupid",
and it's plausible at least. What good does a healthy environment if you don't
have food to eat? What good does economic progress if you don't have security?
The West has operated very similarly imho, we're just further along.
Environmentalism is still fairly young, and so are today's social safety nets
(well, in Europe anyway). I don't see a reason why the Chinese wouldn't follow
on that route (and indeed they are starting to care for the environment more).

> In a liberal democracy, on the other hand, people expect much more
> responsiveness to their concerns. And people tend to value freedom of
> expression and freedom from suppression.

But that's only because the basic needs are generally taken care of. I don't
see any liberal democracy valuing freedom over food security (en masse,
certainly some happily value _their_ freedom over the food security of others
in society).

~~~
Arn_Thor
> I don't see a reason why the Chinese wouldn't follow on that route

That was the hope and belief behind Nixon's trip to China, and the inclusion
of China into the WTO. But with Xi taking power, arguably the most
totalitarian leader in China since Mao, there is no sign that civil liberties
are anywhere on the horizon.

> But that's only because the basic needs are generally taken care of.

History does not agree with you, I think. People were fighting for democracy
as a response to totalitarian systems which did not provide them with the
resources and security they wanted—even before the age of plenty brought about
by industrialization. And when the west was democratized, a lot of those
countries were ravaged by two world wars, and far behind where China is today.

And when it all got underway, were not the ideals of the enlightenment in
large part a counter to monarchies and feudalism which failed to provide what
the people needed? If one sets aside the notion that without freedom, a
plentiful existence loses its meaning (which is another, philosophical
argument), I think the fight for representation in government is precisely a
fight to achieve one's economic and social goals.

~~~
luckylion
> there is no sign that civil liberties are anywhere on the horizon

The main question is probably what time frame that horizon is. It's hard to
predict the future, very, very few people in 1985 (or even in '88) believed
the SU would collapse, and yet it did a short time later. "The Chinese are
destroying their environment" was a meme, now they are somewhere at the top
regarding new sustainable energy installed, and they are fighting pollution
(Beijing is in the situation Los Angeles was a few decades ago).

> People were fighting for democracy as a response to totalitarian systems
> which did not provide them with the resources and security they wanted

That's what I'm trying to say. People want stuff, and a mostly capitalist,
mostly democratic society is good at providing stuff for a large majority of
the population. If it wasn't, people would care very little for democracy.
Throw us into a hard and long recession and offer a (to the majority of the
population) plausible way out via authoritarian measures and, so I believe,
you'll be surprised how quickly they'll agree to abandon democracy. Democracy
is to most (or to all? a different argument is mostly made by the affluent,
and they never need to choose) a means to an end, not an end in itself. The
CCP is currently still ranking very favorably compared to "before CCP" with
regards to providing stuff. If that changes, or people believe that democracy
could provide significantly more with few trade-offs, I expect the general
sentiment to change. (Pro tip: want to fuel desire for democracies around the
world? Make sure all/most citizens in Western democracies massively profit
continuously from the democratic system, not just a minority at the top)

Given that civil liberties often follow wealth (it's easy to be generous when
you're rich), I don't see why that wouldn't happen in China. They're not at a
Western level of wealth yet, and for a significant part of the population,
poverty is still the primary concern, not civil liberties. When that has
changed, so will demands of the population (though it's unlikely they will too
closely follow Western values, given their culture is very different in many
regards).

------
mortenjorck
The elephant left standing in the room is not the spam and bot accounts, but
the official, state-actor accounts such as Xinhua News that pay for promoted
tweets carrying the same message.

Granted this is likely beyond the scope of Twitter’s safety team, but this
completely sidesteps the issues raised here:
[https://techcrunch.com/2019/08/19/twitter-is-blocked-in-
chin...](https://techcrunch.com/2019/08/19/twitter-is-blocked-in-china-but-
its-state-news-agency-is-buying-promoted-tweets-to-portray-hong-kong-
protestors-as-violent/)

~~~
martey
See
[https://blog.twitter.com/en_us/topics/company/2019/advertisi...](https://blog.twitter.com/en_us/topics/company/2019/advertising_policies_on_state_media.html),
which was posted to the Twitter blog at approximately the same time as this
post.

~~~
CobrastanJorji
So, wait...is the BBC no longer allowed to advertise upcoming shows on
Twitter?

~~~
tareqak
I was confused about this part too, but that link does have this:

> This policy will not apply to taxpayer-funded entities, including
> independent public broadcasters.

Britain's BBC, Canada's CBC, and the US PBS should be covered by that.

Actually, what's to stop China from making their news agency tax-payer funded
to take advantage of this exception?

~~~
noarchy
How about state media that is already taxpayer-funded? Do they really get an
exception here?

~~~
tareqak
The quote in my comment has "independent public broadcasters". I think they
will depend on third parties in order to make that determination.

~~~
noarchy
That was my assumption as well. I can't imagine they'd put the North Korean
state broadcasters on the same level as BBC or CBC.

------
envy2
Facebook made a similar announcement today:
[https://newsroom.fb.com/news/2019/08/removing-cib-
china/](https://newsroom.fb.com/news/2019/08/removing-cib-china/)

~~~
doubleunplussed
Wow, those posts. They are so unsubtle.

------
xt00
Was in China when the first protest happened and the news coverage was mostly
saying things like that the people are clueless in Hong Kong and don’t
understand the law about extradition. They had various experts all saying
similar things and they would also point to random weibo posts about totally
not on the payroll “people” saying they want their city back from the
protesters.. I mean it’s one thing if China’S central government wants Hong
Kong to be a certain way but dressing it up as “lots of ordinary folks agree
with them” is pretty disingenuous and it seems very fair for any platform to
call the government out on it—-especially non-Chinese owned platforms.

~~~
derefr
> but dressing it up as “lots of ordinary folks agree with them” is pretty
> disingenuous

I wouldn't say it's disingenuous... given that there's nothing legally
preventing mainland-Chinese from choosing to live in HK, and then being quoted
as people who want "their" city back.

Odd to think, but HK is now experiencing a real _Red Scare_ , the likes of
which the US only ever imagined in the depths of paranoid delusion. There are
real (CCP) Communists, living amongst the HK citizenry, nudging HK's democracy
(such as it is) toward their agenda by appearing to stand for "public
sentiment"!

~~~
prewett
I believe that mainland people have to apply for a special permit to even
cross the border into HK. I would expect it to be even harder to live there as
a mainlander. So while they may be posing as HK residents on Twitter, I don't
think they are in reality.

~~~
yomly
How old is your knowledge? China changes fast - my impression was that it was
quite straightforward to go to HK. At least for people in SZ...

~~~
robocat
Shenzhen is a special economic zone, which had its own border with mainland
China until early 2018.

[https://www.scmp.com/news/china/policies-
politics/article/21...](https://www.scmp.com/news/china/policies-
politics/article/2128370/bring-down-wall-china-officially-scraps-border-
around)

~~~
886
it's not a real boarder. and regardless the so called boarder was effectively
gone since early 2000s.

------
flying_sheep
I was living in HK for 30 years. What I want to say is that we all need to
prepare for a new form of propaganda, which is partially based on partial fact
but with twisted explanation. They are getting more logical, therefore more
persuasive to middle-classes. If we do not have freedom or human rights in our
minds, it will be very hard to deny those propaganda.

~~~
mef
Historically the most effective propaganda has been based partially on fact.
Outright fabrication doesn't work as well as taking an accepted fact and
twisting what came before or what will come after.

~~~
flying_sheep
True. And this is getting worse because China is now rich. In old time, only
brain-washed patriots believe those propaganda. But now CCP hires well-
educated writers, Weibo opinion leaders to write seemingly objective articles
that credit CCP exclusively with the economy growth. The middle classes in
China has already believed in those propaganda faithfully because the messages
match perfectly what they have experienced.

We need to be afraid of them. Because even if the Great Firewall disappears
now, they will continue to defend CCP and their authoritarian system.

~~~
886
"This is getting worse because US is now poor. In old time, only patriots
believe those propaganda. But now the media hires well-educated writers,
YouTube opinion leaders to write seemingly objective articles that credit
Trump exclusively with the economy growth. The lower classes in the US has
already believed in those propaganda faithfully because the messages match
perfectly what they have experienced. We need to be afraid of them. Because
even if neo-nazism disappears now, they will continue to defend Trump and his
beliefs."

Wondering if I am wrong? Even if I am wrong, how wrong???

------
ktln2
China has been doing this for a while, not only on social media, but
traditional media / institutions too. It's about time to get serious about
this problem.

[https://www.hoover.org/news/china-exerting-sharp-power-
influ...](https://www.hoover.org/news/china-exerting-sharp-power-influence-
american-institutions)

~~~
prewett
It's inherent in all communist states (that have existed). There is a document
called "Chapter NN", where NN is some number, I think in the teens, from
eastern Europe that describes the dynamic. Unfortunately I have no idea how to
search for it, so if someone could post a link I'd be grateful. If I recall
correctly, the problem is that the State claims to represent the people, but
in fact it does not represent the people. Thus, it must lie in everything it
says, otherwise it could not claim to represent the people.

------
sp332
This doesn't really explain the money they took from Xinhua News to promote
certain tweets that lied about the protests being violent or unwanted by the
majority of HK residents.
[https://twitter.com/pinboard/status/1162711159000055808](https://twitter.com/pinboard/status/1162711159000055808)
[https://www.businessinsider.com/twitter-is-running-paid-
ads-...](https://www.businessinsider.com/twitter-is-running-paid-ads-china-
criticising-the-hong-kong-protests-2019-8)

~~~
camgunz
It's just a little further down:
[https://blog.twitter.com/en_us/topics/company/2019/advertisi...](https://blog.twitter.com/en_us/topics/company/2019/advertising_policies_on_state_media.html)

~~~
sp332
Thanks. That's pretty clearly motivated by recent disinformation campaigns,
but doesn't mention them at all. Kinda lets them off the hook in my opinion,
not to mention keeping the money.

Edit: Facebook, for example, calls them out directly.
[https://newsroom.fb.com/news/2019/08/removing-cib-
china/](https://newsroom.fb.com/news/2019/08/removing-cib-china/)

------
hker
For those who want to understand the bigger picture of this propaganda
campaign, check out this allegedly leaked instruction for how China controls
media (picture in Chinese [1], transcribed in Chinese [2], google translated
to English [3]).

[1]: [https://pincong.rocks/article/3572](https://pincong.rocks/article/3572)

[2]: [https://pastebin.com/anMtU0Lz](https://pastebin.com/anMtU0Lz)

[3]:
[https://translate.google.com/translate?hl=en&sl=auto&tl=en&u...](https://translate.google.com/translate?hl=en&sl=auto&tl=en&u=https%3A%2F%2Fpastebin.com%2FanMtU0Lz)

~~~
LilBytes
[3] - what a read.

"5\. Video images of excessive use of force by police from outside the country
must be promptly blocked and deleted at the first time, and it is absolutely
forbidden to spread on WeChat and any social media."

~~~
hker
For a better translation then the Google translate (i.e., [3] above), see the
following Reddit comment:

[https://www.reddit.com/r/HongKong/comments/csj4ca/chinas_pro...](https://www.reddit.com/r/HongKong/comments/csj4ca/chinas_propaganda_strategy_for_the_hong_kong/)

------
29_29
I was recently in Beijing and noticed when posting on Instagram many bot
accounts posting "Shame on Hong Kong" in Chinese.

This is a Facebook problem too. If you work at facebook please help!

~~~
bertil
Flag all the accounts that seem suspicious. The more signal, the easier for
Threat Intelligence to identify them.

~~~
29_29
I did, but I feel like this could be solved with machine learning.

~~~
alephnan
Seems like flagging the accounts should, in theory, feed back as data points
into their machine learning models?

------
theirkf
So this has become the norm now. Social media products who’s primary utility
is to share information between people are now being used by governments to
sow discord.

~~~
novok
Your basically complaining that paper can be used to write whatever you want
on it, by you and by people you don't like.

~~~
ssully
Not even close to an accurate comparison. It's not just paper - it's a
printing press that can push your message directly to a device into the pocket
of people who belong to specific groups that you want to target.

~~~
i_cant_speel
How is that different from spreading false information through newspapers when
that was the primary source of people's information?

~~~
laughinghan
It's like the difference between the bow-and-arrow and handguns. Lower barrier
to entry, greater potential for harm.

------
roddux
I'm curious if Twitter would publish such pieces if the US was favourable with
China's position in this conflict. Makes you wonder.

Or, to bring the issue home a bit: would Twitter post this information if they
discovered the democrats running such a campaign? What about the republicans?

------
kerng
1.7 million were marching on the streets yesterday. Imagine, that's like every
4th resident of Hong Kong.

------
r1b
Would twitter, fb et al ever expose a Western intelligence operation with this
tone?

See
[https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Manufacturing_Consent](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Manufacturing_Consent)

Edit: In other words, is this post itself not an “information operation”?

~~~
Schnitz
A foreign state actor is using a platform maintained by a US-based company to
spread anti-democratic propaganda that goes against the values of the US. They
got blocked and called out. Sounds like a no-brainer to me, especially after
the 2016 election.

------
b_tterc_p
Maybe one day our cyberpunk corporate overlords will be able to fine
governments for this kind of shit.

~~~
crispyambulance
Ain't gonna happen.

In reality, our cyberpunk overlords will fall over themselves to provide the
best level of service to the highest paying autocratic government customers.

~~~
jessaustin
Is there a meaningful difference between a "fine" levied on the state by a
firm and a fee the state pays the firm for a service? I'm reminded of Joe
Nacchio... there's a guy who didn't understand this business.

------
JumpCrisscross
What can technically-savvy Americans with moderate resources on hand do to
help the protesters?

~~~
KerrickStaley
Do what you can to make democracy stronger at home. In the long run, what will
help Hong Kong and other places that are at crossroads on the path to fully
democratic rule is to have strong examples of thriving democracies that they
can look to.

------
throwawayxx879
This is a good start, but there are well coordinated manipulation networks for
conflicts around the world, that seem to run with impunity, sometimes inciting
violence and fomenting hate. Then there are verified account of
journalists/commentators and public figures who seem to be paid to Tweet
particular narratives. There are other verified accounts that serve as a nexus
of hate on Twitter, whose large follower counts give them a patina of
invincibility. It’s interesting that Twitter has the will to enforce its rules
in some situations, but not in others.

------
apo
> We are disclosing a significant state-backed information operation focused
> on the situation in Hong Kong, specifically the protest movement and their
> calls for political change.

Two points:

1\. The post presents no evidence that this is a "state-backed" operation.

2\. Censorship seems like a wonderful tool when applied to your opponents.
That support dries up pretty quickly when the censor targets you.

~~~
ddlsmurf
Is there another actor than the state in China that can get unfiltered
mainland IPs ?

~~~
oefrha
If you use Google Fi’s cellular data in China, you can access sites typically
blocked by GFW (source: first hand experience). So I assume the answer is yes.
Not sure which entities have such access though.

Edit: IIRC some local friends from Peking University and Tsinghua University
once told me that they could use Google and stuff (also typically out of
reach) from their college dorms.

~~~
selectodude
All foreign roaming users can get through the GFW. The local carrier sends
everything through what is basically a VPN to your home cell carrier so it can
be properly billed. A popular way to get around GFW for those with money is to
use an HK cell phone in China.

~~~
ddlsmurf
But then you don't have a mainland IP

------
spion
I can't help but think that shadow-flagging these accounts would be more
useful than blocking or deleting them.

Blocking/deletion looks like censorship, like someone is deliberately trying
to hide something you're not supposed to know.

Leaving the content available, but flagging it as suspicious and linking to
more information why its suspicious seems a lot more effective.

------
aussieguy1234
This amounts to cyberwarfare being directed from China at its own people in
Hong Kong.

The posts were designed to sow political discord, not calm things down.
Governments are generally interested in promoting peace and stability. But not
this one, apparently.

Its good to see Facebook and Twitter coordinated with each other in blocking
the bad actors, rather than tackling the issue individually. I'd like to see
more of that in the future directed at Russian government sponsored troll
bots, Nazis and the like. Since these kinds of attacks are generally done over
more than one social network, sharing basic info like IP addresses etc could
be a good start.

These people are banned from Libr, the social network I built to replace
Tumblr ([https://librapp.com](https://librapp.com)).

------
iserlohnmage
[https://reddit.com/r/HongKong/comments/csk1z8/leaked_possibl...](https://reddit.com/r/HongKong/comments/csk1z8/leaked_possible_ccp_propaganda_agenda_against_the/)

------
mrhappyunhappy
I wish they would do this for politicians too. I see hundreds, possibly
thousands of accounts spamming political propaganda garbage right at home.

It would be great if Reddit did the same too. Thousands of sock puppet
accounts on Reddit.

------
guruz
This makes total sense.

It's in Twitter's business interest to have open unfiltered internet as much
as possible. By keeping Hong Kong open (and possibly getting China to open at
some point), they'll help their bottom line.

------
spyckie2
One of the lessons learned in the modern era is that you just can't get away
with this kind of stuff - everything comes back to bite you in the end.

I don't know which government officials in the communist party thinks this
kind of investment will be successful - and it may be short term successful -
but you end up paying for it in the long run.

Maybe said gov't official ran a business selling chinese goods on Amazon and
used fake reviews to successfully grow the business by pawning off really
poorly made products into consumer hands. He/she witnessed the success and
applied that theory everywhere - you can always buy your way to a good
impression.

Well, it works (kinda) on Amazon because the blame and outrage still gets
created, its just that there's no entity to ascribe the blame onto. The store
is usually brandless, or can rebrand itself in an instant if things go south.

BUT the blame just doesn't dissipate into thin air. No, it gets assigned to
the first thing that does have a permanent brand - Chinese goods. And then,
chinese culture.

The US tried to use covert tactics in the 70s - 90s during the cold war era,
in many places including the middle east. It was a time of naivety where "I
can get away with doing illegal and immoral stuff" was an infectious attitude.
Fast forward 30 years, and the winners are the people who immediately
benefitted from those actions, but the losers (the AMERICAN GOV'T AND PUBLIC)
are still paying the price via terrorism in the form of extra defense costs,
safety concerns, tragedies and more.

Again - blame and resentment doesn't disappear into thin air. It collects,
like pollution, and you pay a price a long way down the road.

China, you're not an anonymous store on Amazon. You're one of the strongest
brands in the world with 5000 years of history. Your brand is larger than
Amazon, Twitter, Facebook, and Google combined. This is just not worth it.

------
pastor_elm
Coordinated activity is banned on twitter? Has someone told Twitter?

------
debt
I absolutely love that they shared the dataset. Hopefully deters future bad
actors as the raw data itself will be shared with the greater public and
hopefully for greater analysis.

------
avip
My YT overlord lately decided I should watch Jackie Chan commentates about the
situation in Hong-Kong [0]. I was very surprised to see the English comments
almost unanimously support China. Would have expected the opposite sentiment.

[edit: stupid me, the uploader is CGTN, a well-known state propoganda channel]

[0]
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M7rIg49I0yI](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M7rIg49I0yI)

~~~
mytailorisrich
Jackie Chan is entitled to his opinions.

During those protests there have been rioting and ransacking of the local
Parliament with some expressing views that HK was not, or should not be,
China. This can genuinely trigger feelings of patriotism and outrage.

The lastest protest seems to have been peaceful and to have respected the
authorities' restrictions as much as possible so it may be that they have
understood that using violence was playing into the hands of the other side.

~~~
justaguyhere
One thing that is super impressive about these protests (other than the sheer
number of people) is the lack of looting, violence etc (not counting police
violence on unarmed people). Very very impressive. Compare this with French
riots etc in recent years - night and day!

~~~
chii
I actually expect that a lot of violence and such are false flag operations,
designed to taint the image of the protesters.

~~~
adventured
Given what we've seen there with the planted triad attacks, it would make
perfect sense that they would infiltrate and stage violence as well. That's a
tactic that has been used even in liberal democracies in the past when dealing
with rampant protests.

------
est
I roughly reviewed these accounts, looks like lots of anti-CCP accounts were
banned as well.

But I think twitter should remain a place for individuals not state actors.

------
throwawaysea
What makes coordinated activity from government entities different from
brigading performed in coordinated ways by non-government people with
political or activist agendas? Isn’t that also manipulation? Or is it that
Twitter just has its own political and economic agenda and their
TOS/rules/blog posts are self-justification?

~~~
woutr_be
In my opinion; the main difference here is that the government entities used
bots or paid people to post propaganda. While the pro-democracy non-government
camp used their own account to share their views. This I'm okay with.

But a good example on how not to do it is the /r/hongkong subreddit, it's
filled with pro-democracy accounts who will delegitimise any posts that goes
against the general sentiment. It's impossible to have a constructive
discussion there without being marked as a troll, or a pro-china bot. That to
me is just the same as spreading propaganda and preventing free speech. That's
not ok.

------
completelylegit
This sounds like convenient achievement to establish that they’re tough on
shenanigans they don’t like.

------
shireboy
Lesson being if you want to delegitimize an opinion, post en mass in favor of
it from fake accounts.

------
Bhilai
I am curious to know how do companies like Facebook control this kind of
activity on WhatsApp where there is end-end encryption. I see a lot of
propaganda on Whats App being circulated everyday and people keep forwarding
such messages into various groups.

~~~
nobodyshere
Can you seriously trust WhatsApp's security now that it belongs to Facebook?

~~~
mullen
A lot more than I trust China.

------
Nec28
It's so easy to tell lies and have people believe them. That's a big human
flaw it seems :-/ that needs to be corrected, governments and corporations get
away with public opinion manipulation way too easily. >:(

------
vallismortis
It is about time they started calling out state actors. It doesn't even matter
if they are taking active countermeasures as long as the public is made aware
that this kind of thing is happening. It might be more effective if instead of
shutting them down, they add a descriptive warning at the top of the post that
states, "this message contains misinformation that is being deliberately
disseminated by the government of China", along with a link to a relevant
writeup of the issue. If they are going to point the finger, then they should
point it at the instigator, not an "anonymous state actor". Finish growing a
backbone, Twitter.

------
spdmn
While respecting the attempt to be fair and nonpartisan by way of moderating
this site I cant help but feel this soft-touch approach by mods is somewhat
naive.

------
meerita
> Covert, manipulative behaviors have no place on our service

While I celebrate this from them to kill manipulation, this sentence can be
applied to their own bias towards conservative people who get banned and
progressive don't, even saying worse things or using the service on massive
organization to take down accounts. If both parties do harm, they should be
take down. But both Twitter and Facebook do enormous efforts to shutdown
voices. Including Google and Youtube.

~~~
laughinghan
> their own bias towards conservative people who get banned and progressive
> don't

Interesting, what leads you to believe this is the case?

I've heard of this happening; I've also heard of the exact opposite happening,
e.g. this post which cites examples of specific people and pieces of content
that were banned as well as the specific dates and times and durations of the
bans: [https://medium.com/@thedididelgado/mark-zuckerberg-hates-
bla...](https://medium.com/@thedididelgado/mark-zuckerberg-hates-black-people-
ae65426e3d2a)

I'm sure it is true that there are conservatives who've been banned and self-
proclaimed "progressives" who've done as bad or worse things who haven't.
Hopefully you also agree that the examples in that post, of progressives being
banned while racists who should have been banned but weren't, probably really
did happen.

Due to scale, it wouldn't surprise me that all of those examples could be true
without there being any systemic bias on their service. What leads you to
believe that such a bias exists?

From what I've read, there's actually some reason to believe the exact
opposite bias exists: [https://www.propublica.org/article/facebook-hate-
speech-cens...](https://www.propublica.org/article/facebook-hate-speech-
censorship-internal-documents-algorithms)

Again, I think all those examples are probably true. But I think they could be
consistent with a bias in any direction, due to scale.

~~~
meerita
There's plenty evidence, from internal emails calling "nazis" to some
conservatives to presentations, hidden camera to a high level manager, etc.
PrageU, some conservative voices are banned, and there are specific guidelines
designed by them to ban them and shadow ban them. It is not news that Twitter,
Facebook and Google shadowbans or directly demonetize or ban conservative
voices.

~~~
laughinghan
I totally believe there are internal emails calling conservatives "nazis". I
agree that it's not news that they shadowban and demonetize conservative
voices.

I bet there are also internal emails calling liberals "snowflakes" and that
they shadowban and demonetize liberal voices. Are you telling me you believe
that never happens? They've never internally criticized a liberal or banned a
liberal video?

If we agree that they both happen, where's the evidence of _bias_ , rather
than just tons of mistakes due to scale?

------
kryogen1c
This shit is goddamn terrifying. Since when are american corporations the
arbiters of accurate, international, and political, information?

We just crossed the rubicon. Public, proactive action against a relatively
hostile foreign power by a non-governmental entity. If this isnt proof
positive we need to either bust these monopolies or completely overhaul our
view of the power megacompanies wield, idk what is.

~~~
JumpCrisscross
> _Since when are american corporations the arbiters of accurate,
> international, and political, information?_

They're not and that's not what this story is about.

These accounts were banned for violating Twitter's platform manipulation
policy by spamming, co-ordinating activity across multiple accounts, creating
fake accounts, mis-attributing their activity and evading bans.

An individual from Hong Kong or China is free to post exactly what these
accounts tweeted.

------
Gabriel_Martin
I wonder what other sites are seeing this, Reddit and Instagram are pretty
obvious Quora perhaps?

~~~
markdown
/r/sino has been working overtime of late, and sending their minions all over
reddit to push their message.

------
jokoon
Are you saying that the CIA is not trying to help the protests?

I'm not trying to say that the CIA is involved, but I would be surprised to
learn that the US is not trying to get involved to amplify the noise the
protests are making.

With Trump and his trade war, don't you think he would not ask the CIA to try
to damage the reputation of chinese government by using protests?

I don't like the PRC and their method, but I'm just curious to ask what the US
is doing.

~~~
yyhhsj0521
Who says anything about CIA?

Please don't bring whataboutism into the discussion.

~~~
jokoon
I'm not trying to downplay what the PRC is doing, I'm just asking about what
is the us might be doing.

------
dwd
This is an even more disturbing trend...

[https://www.news.com.au/national/chinese-police-cars-
parked-...](https://www.news.com.au/national/chinese-police-cars-parked-on-
the-streets-of-australia-spark-alarm-amid-hong-kong-protests/news-
story/4709b12e4c4eb8e42a958fc7e19e3b95)

------
EGreg
How does a platform prevent coordinated activity if it allows end to end
encryption?

------
countryqt30
I strongly encourage Facebook and Instagram to follow suit!

------
sytelus
I'm assuming they used some sort of distributed bot framework to create
thousands of accounts. So wouldn't they just recreate them again? Is it even
possible to prevent this from happening again?

------
standardcitizen
Is anyway else underwhelmed by the number of accounts?

------
kpU8efre7r
This is so refreshing to see. Good on Facebook and Twitter for trying to be
part of the solution.

------
groundlogic
I don't think HN is immune to these kinds of CCP ops.

~~~
kelnos
I doubt HN is even on the CCP's radar. Not only are we a low-value target,
we're much harder to subvert.

~~~
munificent
_> we're much harder to subvert._

Surely, "I'm confident I'm not gullible" is the primary risk factor for
actually being gullible.

~~~
klingonopera
...but it's actually because we are aware that we _are_ gullible that makes a
difference, not because we consider ourselves immune to it.

At least, that's how I see it...

------
guerrilla
.

~~~
gtirloni
You should read the linked article.

~~~
guerrilla
.

~~~
testvox
They specially address your question.

> This policy will not apply to taxpayer-funded entities including independent
> public broadcasters.

------
profalseidol
Yeah, time to get Julian Assange and Snowden back to America (gitmo)! The land
of the free (for non-natives)!

------
thecleaner
Way to go Twitter. Of course this is because they dont make ad money in China.
But its a very very welcome step.

------
bouncycastle
One of the strangest things I seen so far was not online but on the street in
Sydney, Australia. There was an "anti-democracy protest"
[https://www.smh.com.au/world/asia/anti-hong-kong-protest-
in-...](https://www.smh.com.au/world/asia/anti-hong-kong-protest-in-sydney-
marred-by-ugly-confrontation-20190817-p52i4f.html)

It looks people who oppose Hong Kongers really exist and truly hold on to
their beliefs.

~~~
diNgUrAndI
Why not? Even within HK there are thousands pro-police anti-protest
supporters.

[https://www.hongkongfp.com/2019/08/17/oppose-violence-
save-h...](https://www.hongkongfp.com/2019/08/17/oppose-violence-save-hong-
kong-476000-attend-pro-police-rally-organisers-say/)

Our opinions are shaped by what media are fed into our brains. I saw my
friends divided into two camps because of the different media articles they
read.

How do you make sure you are not biased and only read what you believe? Rad
more and find the opposing articles!

~~~
bouncycastle
> Why not?

Of course, Australia is a democracy so they are free to do so. The irony is
that these "anti democracy" protestors are exercising their democratic right
to protest!

Perhaps there are probably ulterior motives for their behavior, eg. these
people want to prove their loyalty to the party in order to gain a better
acceptance/ranking, or there kinds of peer pressure. Others could be simply
influenced by the CCP mouthpiece - it to has reached Australia. Finally, some
could actually be paid - the stakes are high enough.

I'm finding it difficult to accept these people actually believe that
oppression of a minority is the right thing. Deep down, their beliefs are
shallow and probably exist because nobody has challenged them. So engaging
them rather than bannig or downvoting would be better

~~~
diNgUrAndI
> The irony is that these "anti democracy" protestors are exercising their
> democratic right to protest!

It's also irony that when "protestors" (or just people voicing their opinions)
exercising democratic rights to protest are treated differently because they
don't agree with your view.

From what I chatted with my friends, this is not about loyalty to any party.
It's as simple as, when people spreads misinformation about your hometown,
others seeing them and starting to talk legitimate shit about your hometown,
you feel angry and voice your strong opposite opinions.

> Others could be simply influenced by the CCP mouthpiece Yeah, right. A large
> number of Chinese students/immigrants, being in Australian democracy and
> with access to all press articles on both sides, have lost their judgements
> and can't tell what are facts at all.

> some could actually be paid - the stakes are high enough. Please back this
> claim with sources.

From my experience, the people sharing the posts are ordinary people, who
simply voice their concerns. Given the sheet number of them, paying them is
not practical.

The irony is that we did see some posts about HK "pro-democracy" organizers
paying protesters for them to go on the streets.

~~~
bouncycastle
One thing I've noticed about some Australian protests, especially in Sydney
when I attended some for a different thing a while back, is that there are
actually a lot of "anarchists" around who love to attend any rallies and just
stir shit up. These guys neither like any sort of governments, always come
with their conspiracy theories... The three letter agencies, or harbour some
other kinds of radical views, eg anti-Semitism. In other words, lots of
weirdos.

Your're right, I have actually no evidence of anyone getting paid, so I'll
retract that statement.

Curious, what kind of misinformation have you heard about your hometown? What
are some of the strong opinions you would like to voice?

------
sephamorr
If you'd like to read a well researched book on the subversive goals of the
CCP, I suggest you read "Silent Invasion"[1]. Note that there some critical
reviews of this book, suggesting it's connecting dots where there isn't true
motive, but little criticism of the evidence presented. I encourage you to
read it and make up your own mind and draw your own narrative around the
facts.

[1][https://www.amazon.com/Silent-Invasion-Chinas-Influence-
Aust...](https://www.amazon.com/Silent-Invasion-Chinas-Influence-
Australia/dp/1743794800)

------
alephnan
I immediately thought to lookup Twitter's company about section. Under Values:

> We believe in free expression and think every voice has the power to impact
> the world.

Edit: I didn’t realize I appeared to be supporting the trolls. No, I meant
it’s good to know Twitter would support the Hong Kong protestors.

~~~
djohnston
authentic voice, not paid gov't troll armies.

~~~
magduf
Devil's advocate: what if the "troll army" is actually a whole army of people
from that country who are brainwashed to believe the party line? Is that not
"authentic" if they really believe it?

~~~
djohnston
not if they're being paid to produce the content (wumao pawns are). if they're
NOT being paid, i would guess you are right, but frankly we should have
disconnected china from the free world a long time ago and only given them
logistics software. it's frustrating that they shut the west out but
constantly try and infect the west with their backwards ideas

------
ThinkBeat
An analysis of information operations that caused and more importantly
sustained the protests would be equally interesting.

I am 90% certain that foreign intelligence services or service are actively
involved in the riots.

Probably funding it at least partially and inciting the crowd. Probably have
assets in the group of protesters to direct their activity.

I have written before that China has been far more lenient than the US would
have been under similar circumstances.

The moment someone had broken into congress they would most likely get shot,
at least enough to stop them.

Shutting down an airport would mean spending quite a bit of time at a
"detainment camp". Often in warehouses created by law enforcement to hold a
large number of people outside of regular courts and jails (See the DNC in
Denver).

The protesters are, for whatever reason, hell-bent on forcing China to act in
a brutal manner. Any regime would.

~~~
mythrwy
While that possibly might be, there are legitimate grievances when you see
that many people in the street.

I'd say this is almost certainly not instigated by foreign intelligence
services and I'm skeptical they would risk trying to run it. (they probably
aren't too broken up about it happening though).

------
rjf72
This seems like a very slippery slope.

Recently Jackie Chan and Liu Yifei are a couple of higher profile individuals
have expressed support for the mainland or condemnation of the protesters'
riotous behavior. Jackie Chan is a Hong Kong national - Lieu Yifei is Chinese
American. The reason that this is relevant is because we live in the day and
age where holding the wrong opinion is increasingly frequently grounds for
getting black listed or worse. They feel strongly enough that they're willing
to risk an _immense_ amount, just to share their views and values.

They they feel so strongly about this issue is reasonable evidence that _many_
others also likely feel strongly about this issue, and not necessarily in
support of the protesters. Consequently, there are undoubtedly large numbers
of people expressing genuine negative views against the protesters. How many
of these individuals ended up getting banned? It's twitter. A huge chunk of
the userbase posts like bots. There's not exactly a whole lot of insightful
discussion going on with 140 characters + memes. When you get into political
talking points where real people are simply repeating the same talking points
at one another, this gets even more extreme.

~~~
sephamorr
I just looked through Jackie Chan's movies for the past few years, and they're
almost exclusively produced by mainland Chinese film companies. I understand
he's a Hong Kong national, but it seems that he is toeing the line for the
movie industry he's working for. Considering how the Chinese have cracked down
on Cathay Pacific (forcing them to fire employees who have participated in the
protests), I doubt a mainland movie star could get away with saying anything
else.

~~~
rjf72
Here [1] is Chan's filmography. He's very active in the American industry
still. Using the fact he also acts in Chinese films against him is not very
reasonable. And Liu Yifei is American Chinese and literally just got her big
break playing the lead in Mulan.

It seems increasingly disturbing to me that people seem to want to assume that
anybody who holds a different view from them must be a "troll" or some sort of
secret government conspirator or whatever else. Social media echo chambers are
making people increasingly incapable of understanding that people can see the
same information, without omission or ignorance, and come to different
conclusions.

~~~
JumpCrisscross
> _Using the fact he also acts in Chinese films against him is not very
> reasonable_

Sure it is. He's economically and likely personally exposed to Beijing. China
has no rule of law. Offending Xi's government carries drastically harsher
consequences than doing something similar in a country with the rule of law.

~~~
rjf72
No, it's not because a Chinese actor acting in some Chinese films is about as
irrelevant as you could get _unless_ you are claiming that anybody with any
connection to China now cannot be trusted because they 'might' be
'compromised.' And in such case you would effectively disqualify 100% of the
people with a direct interest in this, unless they happen to agree with you.

It's logic akin to:

\- only pious individuals can be trusted

\- it would be impious to argue against the 'fact' that everything revolves
around the Earth

\- since no pious person would ever make such an argument, only impious
individuals would and impious individuals cannot be trusted.

\- only untrustworthy individuals would claim Earth is not the center of the
universe and all within it

\- since no trustworthy individuals are among the heliocentric claimants, it
must be the case that they're lying.

\- QED: the earth is the center of the universe according to any and all who
can be trusted

~~~
JumpCrisscross
> _acting in some Chinese films is about as irrelevant as you could get_

He has current and future income from, as well as assets in, China. That's all
jeapordised by deviating from the pro-Xi line. His views are fundamentally
conflicted.

