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Report Claims That 18 Nation's Elections Were Impacted By Social Engineering Last Year (bbc.com)
sqorbit writes: Independent watchdog group Freedom House released a report that claims that 18 nation's elections were "hacked." Of the 65 countries that Freedom House monitors, 30 appear to be using social media in order to affect elections by attempting to control online discussions. The report covers fake news posts, paid online opinion writers and trolling tactics. Other items in the report speak to online censorship and VPN blocking that blocks information within countries to interfere with elections. The report says net freedom could be aided by: large-scale programs that showed people how to spot fake news; putting tight controls on political adverts; and making social media giants do more to remove bots and tune algorithms to be more objective.
Can you BELIEVE IT! Someone used INFORMATION to INFLUENCE people's MINDS! WOW!!!
Only 18? I thought that ALL elections were subject to "Social Engineering".
That's part of the point.
Elections aren't about being fair. They're about preventing civil war.
They do this by predicting how a civil war to reverse their decision would come out - believably enough to convince the losers of the election that they'd also lose the war to reverse their results.
Propaganda and other "fake news", to recruit and radicalize cannon-fodder for the civil ware are integral to the process. The election process SHOULD include them - or it becomes less believable and thus less stabilizing.
Bantam Dominique roosters crow a four-note song. Once you've heard it as "Happy BIRTHday" you can't NOT hear it that way
So......there were only elections in 18 countries last year? Is that it?
Seriously, the only reason Trump is president is because he was better at social engineering than Clinton. And I have to hand it to Obama, he pushed that "Hope and Change" meme better than anyone before him ever has. It's all been done before, though.
"First they came for the slanderers and i said nothing."
Aren't elections, in general, nothing more but a huge social engineering scheme at scale ?
Look at Canada's Trudeau winning the election on a 10 billions deficit and featuring a 30 billions one in his first budget ? Or is it just "social engineering" when the "wrong side" wins ?
Social media providers will be taking this very seriously as it undermines their systems credibility as genuine platforms for social interaction. If they don't take credible actions to reduce the flow of spam on their systems, people will eventually catch on that their whole system is a waste of time and move on.
I think it's very obvious players like Facebook etc can do a lot more than they currently are to prevent spam. I'd say it hasn't been a high priority for them and they have actually profited from providing the spammers a platform. However, after Trump's election and the inquiries into foreign state influence on the election, the spotlight has been firmly placed on Facebook and others and the priority on developing counter measures against this sort of abuse of their systems would be going way up.
And that's just the Washington Post!
Not only that, they used social engineering to cause the /. editors to forget how to write a plural possessive.
Nations', not nation's.
Don't disappoint your bird dog. Go to the range.
...because the politicians aren't behind it. The rest of the time its just called a campaign.
Dear aunt, let's set so double the killer delete select all
He so crazy! Luckily here in America we keep him honest with our totally impartial and honest Free Press, who, despite 95% of them donating to the Democrat Party, are totally objective and unbiased.
Ill add to my own AC that im right leaning and young. It isnt a jab at liberals or conservatives or any side. I see it as everyone in their late 30s and down seem to need a spoonfed direction. Nevermind the facts nor intentions
Obama, Clinton and the Democrats were saying the election would not be influenced and that Trump was full of it.
After the election, they changed their tune. So logically this so called article is just butt covering for the fact that leftists lost elections.
Hillary's campaign spent in the 10 digits, largely on "social engineering", with lots of collusion from many media outlets and politically weaponized government agencies. Meanwhile, Trump got elected with his shoe-string incompetent campaign as the (shoe-string incompetent) POTUS.
(Russia spent $100K in "divisive" ads during the election and probably lots of anti-hillary trolling before the election and lots of anti-trump trolling after the election)
Unlimited funding, collusion, and corruption are still not enough to defeat democracy!
So why are incumbent Republicans losing elections now to trans women and lesbians?
Here's a free clue: People are sick of politics as usual and have been for a long time, and so are willing to vote for anything that looks like an outsider who looks like they might have a chance. Which side of politics they come from is irrelevant. That's why they voted for Obama over Hillary, that's why they would have voted for Sanders if he'd been up against an establishment Republican, and that's why they voted for Trump who ran against an establishment Democrat.
Of course now, people are realising that Trump is a shyster who played the greatest confidence trick in American political history. This plan sometimes backfires.
Or we could simply cut the military to a reasonable size and tax upper income earners at rates in line with what the rest of the world do. Then we'd be asking how we are going to spend oir massive surplus.
No. We would be asking what the hell to do with all of these unemployed former military service people.
It is not a pretty picture.
"You want to know how to help your kids? Leave them the fuck alone." -George Carlin
You're a perfect example of a conservative: Primitive. Tribal. Individualistic.
You want liberals to grow up ? Who acted like fucking 15 year-olds during the last election ? Electing a clown as their fucking president, endangering your country, the whole world, the future of your children and grandchildren, all that just to piss off liberals, like fucking teenagers committing armed robery just to piss off their parents. You're the ones who need to grow the fuck up.
Or rather, you need to EVOLVE. The rest of the civilized world is trying to evolve beyond simple animalistic darwinism, while you conservatives cling desperately to your old individualistic, primitive, savage ways. Life on earth has evolved beyond single-celled to multicellular organisms. Now humanity is also evolving from individualistic to communal society. And there's nothing you can do about. The dinosaurs' time is over. YOUR time is over.
Yeah, since when do nerds care about social media, crazy politics and fake news? Even the occasional story actually on computers would be appreciated.
Give great speeches that people in different parts of the USA want to listen to.
Ensure that every state is included in visits by a charming politician who can give a long speech.
Find a candidate who can keep talking for a long time.
"Fake news" and "social media" cannot actually make a politician not show up in person all over the different parts of the USA and give a good speech.
People all over the USA remember who they went to see in person and their ability to give a great speech.
Dont lecture people in different states from the elite coast. All the other states can sway that US election so be more aware of local issues all around the USA.
Dont speak of people all over the USA in a negative way. You need their vote and voters do remember all the negative words used to describe their nice parts of the USA.
Try been positive about each part of the USA and just listen to their needs.
Dont stay on the elite east and west coast giving short lectures to the rest of the USA.
Talk about jobs, freedom and wealth. Real people want real ideas about good jobs, education, housing, not more negative lectures on elite issues.
A really great candidate can get out the vote all over the USA. Staying on elite coast talking points did not win an election.
Election observers from different political parties ensured no federal level "hacking" could happen.
Each city, state, town voted for a person they wanted elected.
The vote got counted and the results showed who the US states wanted elected.
Other nations did not bus out millions of their embassy staff to vote in person all over the USA. The FBI would have noticed a few extra million embassy staff in the USA at that time.
Other nations did not vote in the millions all over the USA. Other nations did not "hack" the computer vote as US elections do not get all counted digitally by one national computer.
The votes get counted and the count is observed locally all over the USA.
Real people all over different parts of the USA selected the person they wanted.
If a political party wants their vote, fly out to their state and talk to lots of people in person.
Domestic spying is now "Benign Information Gathering"
The issue is that people care more about what other folks post or who liked their posts on Facebook or what's on the next episode of Big Brother than who they're voting for.
AND THEN THEY ACTUALLY GO AHEAD AND VOTE ANYWAYS!!!!!!
Of course the trying-to-be-elected are going to abuse the shit out of that, who wouldn't?
I'm over-generalising, sure. But I'm not THAT far off.
I didn't vote in the last Canadian election because every choice sucked. The country's going to hell and all we care about is muslim women wearing cloths in front of their faces. Seriously, what the fuck is wrong with people?? Sorry I've had a few to drink this evening.
I tend to rant.
The real story is that there is a shift in the media market. People no longer go to TV news and news paper they now go to all variation of fast-food media where source of the message is no longer checked. With the amount of information that flows we no longer can look at them with a grain of salt. In old well established news outlets messages were curated for weeks. Now if you do not post in 10 min you are already late.
You get arrested for saying anything AGAINST bad leader, sometimes killed, and on top of that you get social engineering saying "bad leader is good leader, most popular leader with everyone ever".... i.e. the attempt to keep the people from forming opposing groups.
You see this in Russia with Putin, media that reports anything negative finds their staff arrested, opposition leaders who say Putin is corrupt get arrested 'for corruption', and social media pretends Putin is ultra popular beloved by all, when the last free election they he didn't get a majority. Literally pro-Putin districts changed their tally from marginal support for Putin, and reported 92% support for Putin and 98% turnout to swing the vote. That was the last time the rigging was so obviously visible in Russia.
"but thats the price we pay for both free speech and open and free elections."
They don't have those either. The social engineering is to cover the rigging.
USA does NOT have free and fair elections, the people voted against Trump by millions and millions of votes and he got the Whitehouse anyway. Look at Heritage Foundation now, they are vote suppressors, they dream up laws to exclude voters from voting, those laws are passed in Republican controlled States to turn the Senate/Congress votes Republican too.
Trump has created an Election Commissions to turn his loss into a win by suppressing a target of 5 million more votes. The main party in that Commission is the Heritage Foundation representative. That commissions has asked for voting data on everyone in every state, and their party alliance where known (and postal voting record where they postal vote). That data is handed FROM the Election Commission to the Heritage Foundation, who will then analyze it, datamine it, and dream up State law changes to favor their group*.
This is what happens when a subgroup choose the leader, the leader rigs the election to favor the subgroup and politicians state their allegience to that group.
Paul Reynolds, the Republican national committeeman from Alabama said "“My gosh, it's The Washington Post. If I’ve got a choice of putting my welfare into the hands of [Russian President Vladimir] Putin or The Washington Post, Putin wins every time,"
You see how he's laying out his stall to get some Russian hacking, troll and troll money sent his way? You'll see a lot more of that among US politicians.
Does anyone actually believe that local churches don't interfere in elections as well as thousands of commercial organizations? I am certain that the US does a great deal to influence the results of foreign elections as well . Look at lunatic groups like the Tea Party that devote themselves to do nothing but influence elections. Sure, you can bet that if Russia feels that a certain outcome in the US will be better for Russia that great efforts will be made. Our best answer is a much higher level of education for all of our youth. Right now we have a general public that is infested with all kinds of garbage that they believe to be the truth. I fear that if the general public starts to catch on to what is going on around them that all hell will break out and our nation and society might completely melt down. Look at the immoral vampires that now occupy the White House. They want to suck the life blood out of our nation and contribute nothing at all. An entire year has passed and the supposedly important wall is not being built at all. Congress and the Senate are doing nothing good for America or our people.
Slowly merging the language of the insane hyperbole of "election hacking" narrative with the language of traditional political campaigning.
Look, I am not discussing the politics here but cannot resist to point out few things.
Tribal is good. Tribes did not allow "redundant people" to exist, it would be stupid for a small group. Tribes were way more egalitarian than anything civilization has produced. So why the negative undertones? What does individualism has to do with tribalism?!? Those are diametrically opposite, yet you bundle them together into your "negative" package?
What is "animal Darwinism"?!? All mammals are cooperative; it is one of our major strengths. The mammal's social structure is not "nature red in tooth and claw" though of course competition for survival and procreation is a given. But it is us, humans who forgot about it all and build economic totalitarian system which emphasizes too much on competition and greed and too little on cooperation.
It is in our system that the leaders get all the benefits but do not take the responsibility to face the music and protect the people who surrendered their power to them (but this arrangement is a contract, did you forget that?!?) The alpha gorilla meets all danger head on. The tribal chief meets danger head on. The CEO gets golden handshake for ruining people's lives, the president hides in a bunker while the soldiers die...
Conservatives are against biology for mostly religious reasons, but I always wonder why lefties are also so ignorant in it as well. Again I am not disputing your political stance and such.....but there is quite a mess in your head about biology, ecology and anthropology. Just saying...
If you haven't seen it already, you really need to see it.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?...
READY.
PRINT ""+-0
large-scale programs that showed people how to spot fake news, in other words, a central authority that tells people what they should consider true
putting tight controls on political adverts, in other words, disallowing political speech considered untrue by a central authority
making social media giants do more to remove bots and tune algorithms to be more objective, in other words, a central authority telling people how to run a website
Freedom is slavery.
The problem could be solved by educating people to question what they read and do their own research when a subject matters rather than blindly believing what someone else tells them...
But an educated populace is not what the incumbents want, they like the idea of a populace that believes whatever propaganda they read, what they don't like is for anyone else to have the ability to put propaganda infront of large numbers of people.
http://spamdecoy.net - free throwaway anonymous email - avoid spam!
I've always liked Freedom House and often linked to this map as evidence that the countries the US protected ended up more free than the ones the Commies managed to overrun.
https://freedomhouse.org/repor...
Of course when I did that the US left would say that Freedom House was 'a right wing site'.
Now it seems Freedom House - who are doggedly anti Russia/China and pro US - have released a report which fits the 'Russians influenced the election' narrative and it seems that Freedom House are suddenly a trusted source.
Amazing.
echo -e 'global _start\n _start:\n mov eax, 2\n int 80h\n jmp _start' > a.asm; nasm a.asm -f elf; ld a.o -o a;
Well said and very true, however we'll never reach this state because an easily manipulated population is exactly what those in power want, they just want the exclusive ability to manipulate.
Except for situations where "those in power" happen to *actually be* the population.
There's this term "direct democracy". You should research it.
"Sufficiently advanced satire is indistinguishable from reality." - [Tips: 1DrYakQDKCQ6y52z6QbnkxHXAocMZJE61o ]
As a tech community, I believe we should ensure victory for one of these less popular candidates:
(a) Nils Torvalds, Linus's father
(b) Petrus Pennanen, the Pirate Party candidate
It's a tough choice between the two, but I think we'll be happy either way, so let's start the social media engineering right away. Alas, we still use paper ballots, so no machines to hack there.
Escher was the first MC and Giger invented the HR department.
The system in the US is set up around communities of people. The vast majority of communities (typically farming and blue collar communities) in the US votes republican.
If it were a popular vote, we would only have protections for apple, orange and avocado farmers because those are what comprises California and New York.
The system in the US works around equal protection from mob rule. It also protects against anyone stealing the vote in any particular region or certain regions being locally corrupted, if certain counties in Texas reports millions of extra voters because they allow illegal immigrants to vote or simply pay Mexicans to come across the border to vote, you donâ(TM)t want that to be influencing the vote across the nation.
Custom electronics and digital signage for your business: www.evcircuits.com
Yet, New Mexican voters have about twice the influence on the electoral college that North Carolinian voters do.
Correction: All nations' elections have been impacted by social engineering all years through history.
Covert? MMmm hmmmmm.
(-1: Post disagrees with my already-settled worldview) is not a valid mod option.
I don't think this has to do with social media influencing elections insomuch as it might be used nefariously using "Fake News" to unduly impact outcomes.
Now in politics, generally speaking in the best of times, one party's "facts" are another's "lies". However there is a bit of a seperation between what might be a difference of opinion based on ideology VS something that is essentially totally made up. This line is sometimes blurred by those politicians that might shall we say bend the truth a bit more than others, but that has probably been the case since the first election was ever called.
What is more disturbing I think is a failure of journalism in the last decade or so. I think it used to be that news outlets were a bit more independent, and less "affiliated" (i.e. owned) by one partisan group or another, and the people involved had a bit more integrity. The problem arises is when these fake news things happen on things like social media the people have little to turn to in terms of "legitimate" news to tell them any differently. Thus it becomes increasing difficult for people to determine what is "truth" VS what is not, in particular for those people who might not be all that interested in finding out or not really all that engaged in politics in the first place. Again you have whole news sectors essentially pandering to a crowd selling them a service they want to hear, rather than trying to be an unbiased source of information for the population. It is all very idealistic I know, but in a general sense there has been that downward slide it seems, which has allowed these alternative media sources (social) to flourish and be a successful avenue in the first place. I don't think we would even be having this conversation if the legitimate news environment was a healthy one, as people would be more able to easily see the BS for what it is...
Whatever happened to "affected"?
Does everything have to be compared to a meteor strike?
Or is it possible there was no true "impact", in which case the OP was trolling for clicks?
Isn't everything affected by social engineering in some way? Just being a realist, whether it be news, social media, TV, Hollywood movies, video games all play some role in social engineering society and there are more aspects to this that probably haven't even been thought of or publicized. Basing your life around everything you see or hear is definitely not wise. At the end of the day people need to be smart enough to make educated decisions by taking all things into account and with a grain of salt.
I honestly don't think government doing the research themselves would work very well, although I'm open to arguments to the contrary.
"First they came for the slanderers and i said nothing."
Why does everything turn on the "basket of deplorables"? Trump threw out insults like they were candy wrappers, but Clinton wasn't allowed a single insult? There's more to this than the Republicans want to talk about.
Also, Russia bought ads. Russia tried to influence the campaign. Assuming Russians aren't stupid, this suggests that they had some influence. The extraordinary claim would be that Russian efforts were entirely ineffectual.
"When you have eliminated the unacceptable, whatever is left, however improbable, must be the truthiness" - Holmes
Journalists are heavily leftists. Media owners are heavily rightists. You pulled that donation statistic out of your ass.
"When you have eliminated the unacceptable, whatever is left, however improbable, must be the truthiness" - Holmes
Trump isn't the tool of the 1%. He's one of the least scrupulous of the 1%, who are hard at work now trying to set up the country the way they want.
"When you have eliminated the unacceptable, whatever is left, however improbable, must be the truthiness" - Holmes
I think what the Russians did was simply to stir up shit in the hopes that something would gain traction. Then they could throw their weight behind it. There isn't much to indicate that they scored a "hit" to focus on, but that doesn't mean they didn't try.
How is the Riemann zeta function like Trump rallies? Both have an endless number of trivial zeros.
Some parts are definitely new!
- The massive scale. Through Facebook you can reach a lot of people.
- The plausible deniability: "it's was just a few hackers working on their own".
- The targeting. You can target individuals. Old propaganda couldn't.
- The intensity. These systems use 'psychographics' to create models of your psychological weaknesses and use that knowledge to make their messages more difficult to rationally shield yourself against. That's why a well educated populace is not enough.
It's also important to point this out in general, as many geeks still believe that digital technologies will automatically make the world better, and should be embraced as quickly and uncritically as possible. Disruption! Innovation! Yay!
On a side note: I'm always surprised at the immediate "ZOMG this is not new" argumentation. Technological innovation rarely does anything really new (revolution). What technological innovation mostly does is scale things up while lowering the barrier to entry (evolution). But that does change the nature of the thing!
Look at Google Streetview for example. Taking pictures on the street is not new. But scaling it up and automating it breaks through established privacy norms, and really should require a public debate. But this "it's not new" argument hinders having that debate.
I personally gave up voting ages ago, does that make me an idiot?
Yes. Because by not voting you're allowing other people to decide your future. Do you want to live in a country like Cuba or Venezuela? That's what the left wants. A so called utopia that you'll never get. They always fail, yet stupid people STILL believe them. So if you don't want to own anything, want to wonder where you'll get basic needs and such, just keep on not voting or better yet, move to a country like Cuba or Mexico. Don't move to Canada, you wouldn't want to be racist now would you.
Not voting also means you have to STFU about the outcome. You did nothing to change that outcome.
"hacked" using "social media" - ? This is amazing since it has been shown repeatedly that spending vast amounts of money will not guarantee an election win. Who knew that it was enough to sign up for Twitter?
I keep getting redirected to mob rule, group think, and mass hysteria.
Yeah, that's why Switzerland never survived past their first vote... no, wait !
(You, know perhaps making you think that direct democracy couldn't ever be effectively put into practice, *is also* "exactly what those in power want, they just want the exclusive ability to manipulate", as stated by the parent poster.)
"Sufficiently advanced satire is indistinguishable from reality." - [Tips: 1DrYakQDKCQ6y52z6QbnkxHXAocMZJE61o ]