Russian Propaganda Effort Helped Spread 'Fake News' During Election, Experts Say (usatoday.com)

According to the Washington Post (Warning: source may be paywalled; alternate source), the "fake news" phenomenon that circulated thousands of phony stories during the election was aided by a sophisticated Russian propaganda effort that aimed to punish Democrat Hillary Clinton, help Republican Donald Trump and undermine faith in American democracy. Slashdot reader xtsigs shares with us an excerpt from the Washington Post's report: The flood of "fake news" this election season got support from a sophisticated Russian propaganda campaign that created and spread misleading articles online with the goal of punishing Democrat Hillary Clinton, helping Republican Donald Trump and undermining faith in American democracy, say independent researchers who tracked the operation. Russia's increasingly sophisticated propaganda machinery -- including thousands of botnets, teams of paid human "trolls," and networks of websites and social-media accounts -- echoed and amplified right-wing sites across the Internet as they portrayed Clinton as a criminal hiding potentially fatal health problems and preparing to hand control of the nation to a shadowy cabal of global financiers. The effort also sought to heighten the appearance of international tensions and promote fear of looming hostilities with nuclear-armed Russia. Two teams of independent researchers found that the Russians exploited American-made technology platforms to attack U.S. democracy at a particularly vulnerable moment, as an insurgent candidate harnessed a wide range of grievances to claim the White House.

Comments

Not

[jbmartin6]

Just yesterday CNN was running some fake news about a researcher proposing a vote recount, and said researcher had to log a disclaimer. I suppose the Russians were behind that too. They must have also been behind all the fake news about iraq having weapons of mass destruction. Those cunning bastards! Time to call in moose and squirrel!

Re: Not

[Anonymous Coward]

Thanks, jbmartin6, for some additional fake news. There has been no "disclaimer." I even question whether you're a native English speaker, as a native English speaker would know that the correct word is "retraction" or "denial." So this is now it happens, Some makes an unsubstantiated claim, and those who would like to believe, do believe. Next time you post something like this "disclaimer" story, post a link so your claim can be substantiated, researched for verification by a reasonably skeptical person.
As a side not, NPR ran a story on fake news a couple of days ago (http://www.npr.org/sections/alltechconsidered/2016/11/23/503146770/npr-finds-the-head-of-a-covert-fake-news-operation-in-the-suburbs) in which they tracked down and interviewed a purveyor of fake news, who made quite a bit of money during this election. One of the things he said in his extended interview was that he tried fake news on the left, but it didn't work. Liberals debunked misinformation in the comments fairly quickly and the stories dies. On the other hand, conservative fake news was eaten up and spread. Draw your own conclusions.

Oh Jesus.

[0100010001010011]

Enough with the Red Scare.

Paul Horner isn't a Russian and was paid $10k to write fake stories

The Macedonian kids aren't russian either.

Re: WaPo?

[Xenographic]

Aside from them holding clandestine events with the DNC their own lawyers said they couldn't do?

Note the email subject is "WaPo party" (i.e. Washington Post) and in response to the statement "They aren't going to give us a price per ticket and do not want their party listed in any package we are selling to donors. If we let them know we have donors in town who will be at the debate, we can add them to the list for the party." we get the reply "Great - we were never going to list since the lawyers told us we cannot do it."

Also, we're totally ignoring that Hillary had her "nerd virgins" (their own words for these people) from Correct The Record doing this.

Re: WaPo?

[Jeremiah Cornelius]

Kuwaiti incubator babies
Saddam did 9/11
Nigerian yellowcake
Iraq's WMD

That's just one set of and endless series.

I don't think the US needs help getting fake news on Page 1 lede.

WaPo - leaders in the post-fact era

[Xenographic]

Fortune is already calling BS on this story: http://fortune.com/2016/11/25/russian-fake-news/