At risk of being called a conspiracy theorist, is it only Russia and China that do this, or do western government agencies also do this, to other countries or even to their own populations?
The West will often hires a private company to do the same thing and calls them "political operatives."
And presumably the "Western" intelligence agencies are doing something. We have evidence of it happening in South Koreaa around 2010, and it's hard to imagine other agencies didn't learn from it's success.
And iirc, there was a bill around 2015 that revoked the blocking of US military from carrying out domestic propaganda. I gotta double check tho.
Edit: It was the State Dept who were banned from domestic propaganda via their broadcast arm under the Smith-Mundt act until 2013 when the ban was lifted.
> So, how is this different compared to a slap by one famous person that got reposted thousand times?
Intent and strategy:
> By constructing a timeline of the IRA messages, they found left-leaning IRA trolls posted large volumes of entertainment content in their artificial liberal community and shifted away from political content late in the campaign. Simultaneously, conservative trolls were targeting their community with increases in political content. The effort would have encouraged the right to vote and the left to ignore politics.
I understand it as analysis going other way. They dont try to trace everyone who tweets about the music guessing their motivations. Instead, they look at known Russia troll accounts and look at what they tweet. Then they look at differences between accounts targeted at left and those on the right.
So, your question is orthogonal - it is impossible to answer.
I think one man publicly assaulting another at an incredibly high-profile event in front of a live global audience was bound to be insanely popular regardless of whether or not a Russian bot army signal boosted it.
While true, it is important to know that they DID signal boost it, and that at least for those couple days, news about Ukraine was more buried than it otherwise would have been.
Don't think in binary terms. Russian influence campaigns excel by exaggerating valid newsworthy events.
> The question was: why is this any different from what happened at the Oscars?
Honestly, the problem with that question is that it's asking about the wrong object.
It's like asking what's the difference between shooting a person and shooting a target, when the bullets are identical. A bullet can be used to perform a lot of different goals, just like a piece of attention-grabbing content can. The thing to pay attention to isn't the content itself, but how it was aimed and who did the aiming.
To give a similar example: The text of the First Amendment says "Congress shall make no law...abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press...," yet slander and libel are still illegal. No amount of banging on that pithy text will change that actual situation.
> Honestly, the problem with that question is that it's asking about the wrong object.
If you want to rephrase the question so it is asking about the right object then be my guest - I see you added an answer too though.
I think we've just answered the question two different ways that ultimately boil down to the same thing. One event happened organically, the other was a deliberate action (with an intent, if you will) even if they both had a similar effect. In fact I suspect The Slap was bigger, but Ukraine wasn't pushed out of the headlines before, during or since the Oscars.
It is internet, so there's plenty of actors, some of them paid, some of them foreign.
I quite remember how the USA openly declared that they are going to influence the whole world via the internet domination, and took responsibility for things such as Arab Spring.
The fit that the USA tries to throw at the face of some music spam-posted by "paid foreign" bots is amusing in that context. And the whole world understands that context. Very. Clearly.
On top of it, the US military and law enforcement agencies use sockpuppet accounts.
Don't get me wrong, I don't agree with any state actors manipulating public perception out of their own interests. Just agreeing that yeah the US pulls quite some bs too
Looking at abstract, the article is not trying to estimate actual impact. Just what those accounts were doing. As, in, it is analysis of actions rather then achievements.
We don't know that. The situation right now is a great example that Russia likes to adjust its "goals" in retrospect, to say this was what they wanted all along.
And "money wouldn't have been spent unless it was deemed necessary"? You have an awfully high opinion of Russian institutions' fiscal responsibility!
I still say what I said right after, and have said for 4+ years: Russian propaganda during the election was probably intended to hobble Clinton with domestic political troubles, not actually for Trump to win.
> We don't know that. The situation right now is a great example that Russia likes to adjust its "goals" in retrospect, to say this was what they wanted all along.
Russia hasn't stated anything on the subject. The goals are evident in the actions.
> By constructing a timeline of the IRA messages, they found left-leaning IRA trolls posted large volumes of entertainment content in their artificial liberal community and shifted away from political content late in the campaign. Simultaneously, conservative trolls were targeting their community with increases in political content. The effort would have encouraged the right to vote and the left to ignore politics.
> And "money wouldn't have been spent unless it was deemed necessary"? You have an awfully high opinion of Russian institutions' fiscal responsibility!
I'm not claiming it was worth it, I'm saying someone there did think it was, evidently.
Honestly the media coverage makes it sound like the Russians run our elections. That perception is a much bigger win from them than anything they got from Facebook ads and bots.
So many Americans want to believe that the only way anybody could ever disagree with their beliefs and preferences is through manipulation by malicious foreign actors.
The reality (that half the population disagrees with them and has different values) is completely unpalatable.
I did not detected such perception, really. There is a lot of blaming other party for wrong values going around all the time. That is not even mutually exclusive with foreign actors trying to influence politics, whether successfully or not.
That is one article, you are saying "Honestly the media coverage makes it sound like the Russians run our elections." and "So many Americans want to believe that the only way anybody could ever disagree with their beliefs and preferences is through manipulation by malicious foreign actors."
I did not seen this opinion that elections were all about Russia to be frequent fo prevalent or dominating either news or what Americans talk about.
Haven't we heard enough of this bad faith narrative already?
> "There are going to be all sorts of bad actors trying to interfere in the midterms, especially in the contested races..."
Vote the way we want you to vote. Otherwise you're being undemocratic! And Russia is to blame!
> "The fact that the average person would not associate music with Russian trolls means that they’re doing a good job."
Isn't this statement a bit Kafka-esque? The implication of this is that if you don't live in fear, somehow associating the mundane flood of meaningless content that is social media with you purposefully being misdirected by Russia, you're just ignorant.
Propaganda is real, it does work, and it is a problem. I struggle to explain why anyone would brush it off, other than it happens to align with their own goals. An electorate that is perpetually thinking and voting with activated amygdalas is not a good thing.
For most of my life I feel like politics has worked that way though. It's human nature to respond to fear. It's why so many people spend more time talking about why we have to stop the other guy from getting in office rather than why our own guy should be there.
And it certainly happens for a reason, besides the empty promises brought by most politicians the most visceral human response comes from fear. The more fearful people are, the easier they are to manipulate in general.
If you take a step back and look at political messages designed to inspire fear, it will all become pretty visible.
> "Propaganda is real, it does work, and it is a problem."
Do the supporters of 'Liberal Democracy' never employ propaganda? I use this as an example since when the issue of foreign interference in the American democratic process is brought up it's usually in the context of the 2016 election. Trump of course representing a deviation from decades of America's foreign policy being the export of 'Liberal Democracy or else'.
> "An electorate that is perpetually thinking and voting with activated amygdalas is not a good thing."
What if people use their "activated amygdalas" and come to conclusions that you don't agree with?
I think you're losing sight of the real issue. Orgs linked to the Kremlin are known to have targeted Americans online, via bots or content farms. This is not in dispute. What was their purpose? What was their goal? Is there any benign explanation? And this kind of thing is not the same as negative attack ads. While those are unseemly and gross, they still have to conform to the rules or face legal consequences. Propaganda on social media can be made up completely, defamatory, and falsely attributed without any consequence. This is not the same as what you might read in the NYT.
I'm pretty sure your last sentence was a typo, but yeah, acting on fear is pretty much bad for everyone. And without FUD, there's no way the walking clown shoes would have been elected in 2016.
Yes, you're right. My last sentence was incorrect. I mean to say:
_"What happens when people use their higher faculties, and end up making a decision that you don't agree with?"_
The past 2 months are evidence that both Russian kinectic and cyber warriors are not 12 feet tall. The next few months will prove they are not 4 feet tall either.
Russian troll farms did play a role, but my hypothesis is they are neither insignificant nor decisive in 2016 election result.
hey thats what the US or any other western government do as well, lets not forget the convenient let's pass these pork filled bills while the plebians are watching their soccer world cup, super bowl etc.that happens EVERYTIME...really democratic too, considering the pork in these bills consist of things the people do not actually want such as making encrypted chats illegal or forcing people to get the jab or lose their jobs makes you wonder where these politicians are getting their ideas from ...
>“You might think you’re clicking on a cat meme, but really you’re potentially putting a troll network into your feed that could later start posting divisive content, or monetize their following.”
The problem is that you can explain this to people in depth, and they just don't care. People are completely incapable of comprehending what a powerful mind control device that glowing rectangle in their pocket is. I think long term this will be a new arena of warfare. The will of the social media content consuming zombies is up for grabs to anyone capable of manipulating them.
This needs some serious qualification... For starters, please feel free to define "divisive". I had no idea we were all under some olbigation to be non-divisive, or "united".
Secondly, HN is full of posts about the ineffectiveness of ad campaigns, advertising in general and even targeted ads at influencing people heavily. These are campaigns often orchestrated by multibillion dollar corporations that hire PhDs of all kinds to tailor their messages. Yet on the other hand -and especially since the media "misinformation" fiasco of resentment over Trump's victory against the elite's better judgement of what's best for the masses own decision making- suddenly any minor foreign group can somehow magically brainwash millions of Americans and others into making all sorts of decisions.
I don't at all doubt that foriegn actors use social networks to spread memes and attempts at viral lies. I've seen plenty of examples of this in action. Its influence level however is being absurdly exaggerated and in very hypocritical, very self serving and ideologically charged ways. All the more laughable is the idea that any of this is something new or outside the area of what supposedly respectable major media organizations would do. Does anyone remember anything about how news sources operated before the advent of the internet? Does anyone recall the innumerable times major publications toed grotesque government lie machines for the sake of specific interests?
Fun fact. In late 1980s USSR used similar tactics in local protests. Hard rock and heavy metal music was next-to-banned. But if there was a protest going on... TV would show heavy metal concerts and music videos :)
I'm starting to believe that there are genuine Western trolls that come up with the "it's all Putin's fault!" whenever the going gets tough, like right at this moment. Didn't think that I would have put an institution like Cornell in the Western troll camp, but I guess that's what hybrid war gets us nowadays.
