So I used to read the comments on The Financial Times articles. The commentariat was more informed, in general, than the average publication's userbase, even if I didn't agree with the political...
So I used to read the comments on The Financial Times articles. The commentariat was more informed, in general, than the average publication's userbase, even if I didn't agree with the political bent.
But if you want to see a pattern of coordinated influence operations, there was a sudden, obvious influx of both Russian and Chinese hard-line political messaging starting in October, 2019 (and I mean, literally, nearly every account with a pro-Russia or pro-China or whataboutist slant was created in that month). And those accounts posted every single day, on almost every article, so much so that any reasonable or worthwhile comments were nearly drowned out. The threads at best turned into mocking the trolls.
Whether or not the influence operations are effective in promoting the party line is almost beside the point. It's also an attempt to out-shout thoughtfulness and sustained community building in opposition to authoritarian messages.
Mark Scott Groups linked with China’s law enforcement peppered more than 50 social media platforms with pro-Beijing messages, Meta says. The campaign, which lasted over a year, garnered few, if...
Mark Scott
Groups linked with China’s law enforcement peppered more than 50 social media platforms with pro-Beijing messages, Meta says.
On Facebook, clandestine users with ties to the authoritarian government racked up more than 550,000 followers by spouting lies about the United States' alleged role in creating the COVID-19 pandemic and criticizing Washington's support of Taiwan.
On Reddit, other China-linked keyboard warriors falsely implicated former British Prime Minister Liz Truss in the death of Queen Elizabeth II.
The campaign, which lasted over a year, garnered few, if any, eyeballs from real social media users, based on Meta's analysis
The China campaign "is the largest covert influence operation that's currently active in the world today," Ben Nimmo, Meta's global threat intelligence lead, told POLITICO. "Pick a place on the internet, and they're probably trying to go there to spread effectively a fairly simple set of messages that praise China and criticize the United States and for Western foreign policies."
Meta did not give further detail on why it had attributed this latest covert digital influence operation to Chinese law enforcement.
The Chinese influence peddlers worked regular office hours, based on Meta's analysis of the covert campaign. The unknown state-linked actors took regularly breaks for lunch and dinner, all done within Chinese timezones — despite the tricksters pretending they were located across the Western world.
Despite the sophisticated tactics, the campaign's impact was negligible, at best. "They don't yet seem to have really reached real people," Nimmo said.
In a separate covert influence campaign, Meta found groups in Russia had created fake news websites that mimicked those of the Washington Post and Fox News to promote the Kremlin's invasion of Ukraine — a tactic the social media giant first flagged last September.
So I used to read the comments on The Financial Times articles. The commentariat was more informed, in general, than the average publication's userbase, even if I didn't agree with the political bent.
But if you want to see a pattern of coordinated influence operations, there was a sudden, obvious influx of both Russian and Chinese hard-line political messaging starting in October, 2019 (and I mean, literally, nearly every account with a pro-Russia or pro-China or whataboutist slant was created in that month). And those accounts posted every single day, on almost every article, so much so that any reasonable or worthwhile comments were nearly drowned out. The threads at best turned into mocking the trolls.
Whether or not the influence operations are effective in promoting the party line is almost beside the point. It's also an attempt to out-shout thoughtfulness and sustained community building in opposition to authoritarian messages.
Mark Scott
Groups linked with China’s law enforcement peppered more than 50 social media platforms with pro-Beijing messages, Meta says.
The campaign, which lasted over a year, garnered few, if any, eyeballs from real social media users, based on Meta's analysis
Despite the sophisticated tactics, the campaign's impact was negligible, at best. "They don't yet seem to have really reached real people," Nimmo said.