Writers of Senate Intelligence Committee report on 2016 US election 'Russian bots' caught running false-flag 'Russian bot' operation

[Delicieuxz]

In a case of not all being what it seems, some of those leading the charge in accusations of interference in democracy by foreign entities have been discovered to be running false flags operations specifically to hype up the impression of foreign interference in US democracy, and to label a political candidate as linked to foreign country so as to help another party's candidate.

 

The operation, called "Project Birmingham", was run by US cyber security company New Knowledge, which is "a small cyber security firm that wrote a scathing account of Russia’s social media operations in the 2016 election that was released this week by the Senate Intelligence Committee".

 

New Knowledge's internal documents detailing their "Project Birmingham" operation and its success in electing their preferred candidate have been leaked.

 

Here’s The After-Action Report From the Alabama Senate Disinformation Campaign

Quote

... we developed a strategy of micro-targeting specific AL districts to radicalize Democrats, suppress unpersuadable Republicans ("hard Re"), and faction moderate Republicans...

 

We targeted 650,000 AL voters, with a combination of persona accounts, astroturfing, automated social media amplification, and targeted advertising. Using these tools, we ran an aggressive campaign that contributed to historically high turnout in the specific Democrat districts we targeted.

 

...

 

We targeted Democratic counties across AL with aggressive anti-Moore memes, and focused on Jones' history prosecuting the KKK. This supported national GOTV efforts that drove historically high black voter turnout.

 

...

 

In total we manufactured approximately 45k Twitter followers, 350k Retweets, 370k Tweet Favourites, 6k Facebook Comments, 10k Facebook reactions, 300k Imgur upvotes, and 10k Reddit upvotes forcing targeted communities to interact with our narratives.

 

Prior to the WaPo report on Moore's alleged child molestation, we provided major news outlets with 4 million social signals (web traffic clicks, comments, shares) indicating that anti-Moore articles were popular, which generated artificial ad-revenue for those publications and influenced their internal metrics.

 

Note: Organic anti-Moore memes increased by 3,000% on Imgur after our amplification.

 

 

 

 

The New York Times has tried to downplay the Russia-smearing false-flag bot operation as being too small to make any difference:

Quote

The secret project, carried out on Facebook and Twitter, was likely too small to have a significant effect on the race, in which the Democratic candidate it was designed to help, Doug Jones, edged out the Republican, Roy S. Moore.

 

...

 

The project had a budget of just $100,000, in a race that cost approximately $51 million, including the primaries, according to Federal Election Commission records.

 

But, it must be remembered that $100,000 happens to be the same amount that Russia was alleged to have spent on ads during the 2016 US presidential election, which was likened to a "Pearl Harbour" attack, despite that the majority of those alleged Russian ads ran after the 2016 US presidential election, that the vast majority of them didn't feature or favour a political candidate, and that the 2016 US presidential election was a $6.5 billion election compared to the $51 million election that the Senate Intelligence Committee report writers tried to sway with $100,000 of false-flag bots.

 

$100,000 of $6.5 billion is 0.0015%

 

$100,000 of $51 million is 0.1960%

 

The social media influence spending by the writers of the US Senate Intelligence Committee report on alleged Russian interference was 130.66 times greater than the alleged Russian ad spending that was presented as a "bombshell" and a "wake up call", and which was likened to Pearl Harbour. Yet, NYT thinks 0.196% of meddling influence in a campaign where their preferred candidate gained a surprise win (by a mere 1.5% vote advantage) is too small to matter, while 0.0015% of meddling influence in another campaign where their preferred candidate lost means the sky is falling.

 

 

I believe people need to be aware that this stuff had been ongoing in the US, Canada, and likely elsewhere for years before the US' 2016 election - and that it wasn't being done by foreign entities:

 

2011 - US: Revealed: US spy operation that manipulates social media

2011 - Canada: Craigslist advert seeks jolly right-wing trolls to help conservative message during election campaign

 

It was also being done during the US' 2016 election, again not by foreign entities.

 

Tech companies also have been known to use similar methods:

 

2006 - Did Nvidia Hire Online Actors to Promote Their Products?

[BuzzLookAnAlien]

At what point do threads stop being considered 'tech news' and start becoming 'political debate' because I'd say this one is pretty close 

[Delicieuxz]

2 hours ago, OnyxArmos said:

At what point do threads stop being considered 'tech news' and start becoming 'political debate' because I'd say this one is pretty close 

The tactic itself is tech-centric, and concerning for people that use social media and also who care about how they're being manipulated through use of tech. In the instance highlighted by the OP, the tactic was used relating to politics. But, the core subject matter is still about tech, and the misuse of it.

 

So long as discussion doesn't become about one political party or candidate versus another, but about the operation, its tech, and the warnings its example provides, it will be a non-political discussion.

[Fnige]

Soo... Could Malcom turnbull (who was replaced by Scotty by... childish methods) use vodka bots to win all along... HEY LABOUR (yes, thats the name) MALCOMMY CHEATED _maybe

[Delicieuxz]

27 minutes ago, Sampsy said:

Some solid evidence you have there published by a self-proclaimed professional troll.

The New York Times?

[RejZoR]

Every time I hear Russians being blamed for US elections I can't stop laughing myself to death. What "bots"? What influence they even had when Murican mainstream media was parroting and shilling leftist candidates so hard I dislodged my eyes because of rolled them so hard...

 

Why is no one blaming Google, Twitter and Facebook for shilling, peddling and pushing leftist candidates (and censoring the opposition)? Always blaming muh Russians and Chinese and never their own domestic shills. They really think people are so dumb they'll just gobble up whatever narrative they push? Some maybe, but majority really isn't that dumb...

[Salv8 (sam)]

1 hour ago, OnyxArmos said:

-snip-

the line between tech and other crap is becoming so thing that it may become two dimensional or even one dimensional!

my god... it's south park all over again! 

[Shreyas1]

the guy that posted those images on medium describes himself as a " Memetic warfare/info war theorist "

[Deus Voltage]

48 minutes ago, RejZoR said:

Every time I hear Russians being blamed for US elections I can't stop laughing myself to death. What "bots"? What influence they even had when Murican mainstream media was parroting and shilling leftist candidates so hard I dislodged my eyes because of rolled them so hard...

 

Why is no one blaming Google, Twitter and Facebook for shilling, peddling and pushing leftist candidates (and censoring the opposition)? Always blaming muh Russians and Chinese and never their own domestic shills. They really think people are so dumb they'll just gobble up whatever narrative they push? Some maybe, but majority really isn't that dumb...

I hear there is a kool-aid shortage, now I know why.

[Delicieuxz]

15 minutes ago, Shreyas1 said:

the guy that posted those images on medium describes himself as a " Memetic warfare/info war theorist "

But, the leaked documents and the operation itself, first reported by New York Times after being told of it at a New Knowledge event, are not theories.

 

Neither are the apologies from people who funded New Knowledge, Facebook's suspension of the New Knowledge CEO's account as well as other related accounts, and the New Knowledge CEO's admission and attempt to explain himself on Twitter, a link to which is included in the article about Facebook suspending his account.

[Shreyas1]

3 minutes ago, Delicieuxz said:

But, the leaked documents and the operation itself, first reported by New York Times after being told of it at a New Knowledge event, are not theories.

 

Neither are the apologies from people who funded New Knowledge, Facebook's suspension of the New Knowledge CEO's account, and New Knowledge CEO's attempt to explain himself on Twitter, a link to which is included in the article about Facebook suspending his account.

i just thought the title was funny...

 

I never actually kept up with the whole Russian thing,  it just sounded way too convenient for the democrats to me

[Jtalk4456]

*Quietly awaits the locking of this status

[RejZoR]

22 minutes ago, Deus Voltage said:

I hear there is a kool-aid shortage, now I know why.

Coz all the russian bots drank it? I tell you, it was the russians. LMAO. There is no kool aid, you have to be blind not to see it. It's so bad it almost borderline epic cringe how bad mainstream media is trying to bend the will of the dumb sheep by feeding them narratives via TV screen and also online. And then they blame the russians who don't give 2 shits about murica lol

[mr moose]

NEws flaSH: viral social media campaign tricks gullible people into voting for someone else.

 

As opposed to just the normal level of stupidity and misinformation on social media causing people to vote for X instead

[BuzzLookAnAlien]

18 minutes ago, Jtalk4456 said:

*Quietly awaits the locking of this status

*Thread

[Jtalk4456]

Just now, OnyxArmos said:

*Thread

*intentionally political baitpost

[Jtalk4456]

4 minutes ago, mr moose said:

NEws flaSH: viral social media campaign tricks gullible people into voting for someone else.

 

As opposed to just the normal level of stupidity and misinformation on social media causing people to vote for X instead

i think the part of this that we should be focusing on is that people ARE falling for this crap, letting facebook posts decide how they vote in elections

[mr moose]

Just now, Jtalk4456 said:

i think the part of this that we should be focusing on is that people ARE falling for this crap, letting facebook posts decide how they vote in elections

Maybe I am just old and thus a bit cynical, but I think people believe what they want to believe because they are people.  You can't educate idiots, and people who don't want to better themselves are idiots.

[BuzzLookAnAlien]

1 minute ago, Jtalk4456 said:

*intentionally political baitpost

Yeah I think there needs to be new rules on what counts as 'tech news'. It's honestly getting to the point where someone would make a 'tech news' thread about Donald Trump saying something what they would consider offensive on Twitter and calling that 'tech news' because Twitter is related to tech.

[Deus Voltage]

15 minutes ago, RejZoR said:

Coz all the russian bots drank it? I tell you, it was the russians. LMAO. There is no kool aid, you have to be blind not to see it. It's so bad it almost borderline epic cringe how bad mainstream media is trying to bend the will of the dumb sheep by feeding them narratives via TV screen and also online. And then they blame the russians who don't give 2 shits about murica lol

Not talking about the Russian bots. I'm talking about your anti-left agenda that's borderline (if not already) conspiratorial. 

[BuzzLookAnAlien]

1 minute ago, Deus Voltage said:

Not talking about the Russian bots. I'm talking about your anti-left agenda that's borderline (if not already) conspiratorial. 

21 minutes ago, RejZoR said:

mainstream media is trying to bend the will of the dumb sheep by feeding them narratives via TV screen and also online. 

 

Why do all these politically related tech news threads always end up like this

[Jtalk4456]

1 minute ago, OnyxArmos said:

 

Why do all these politically related tech news threads always end up like this

like i said, i'm waiting for someone to lock this... it will happen

[Deus Voltage]

4 minutes ago, OnyxArmos said:

 

Why do all these politically related tech news threads always end up like this

 

Just to clarify, I was specificially talking about this:

 

Quote

What influence they even had when Murican mainstream media was parroting and shilling leftist candidates so hard I dislodged my eyes because of rolled them so hard...

 

Why is no one blaming Google, Twitter and Facebook for shilling, peddling and pushing leftist candidates (and censoring the opposition)? Always blaming muh Russians and Chinese and never their own domestic shills. They really think people are so dumb they'll just gobble up whatever narrative they push? Some maybe, but majority really isn't that dumb...

 

I specialized in Media studies for my MA, so I know for a fact that mainstream outlets (in the U.S.) are neither Conservative or Liberal. They're elitist apparatuses that generate artificial divisions among the public to generate money and relay establishment agenda.  

[BuzzLookAnAlien]

Just now, Deus Voltage said:

I specialized in Media studies for my MA

We were told at highschool that if a course has to justify itself by adding 'studies' on the end then it's probably not worth the time or money doing it  

[Deus Voltage]

Just now, OnyxArmos said:

We were told at highschool that if a course has to justify itself by adding 'studies' on the end then it's probably not worth the time or money doing it  

Okay....? I can pm you my dissertation if you still think I'm lying.