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Russian Influence Campaign Sought To Exploit Americans' Trust In Local News (npr.org)
An anonymous reader quotes a report from NPR: The information operatives who worked out of the Internet Research Agency in St. Petersburg did not stop at posing as American social media users or spreading false information from purported news sources, according to new details. They also created a number of Twitter accounts that posed as sources for Americans' hometown headlines. NPR has reviewed information connected with the investigation and found 48 such accounts. They have names such as @ElPasoTopNews, @MilwaukeeVoice, @CamdenCityNews and @Seattle_Post. "A not-insignificant amount of those had some sort of variation on what appeared to be a homegrown local news site," said Bret Schafer, a social media analyst for the Alliance for Securing Democracy, which tracks Russian influence operations and first noticed this trend. Another example: The Internet Research Agency created an account that looks like it is the Chicago Daily News. That newspaper shuttered in 1978. The Internet Research Agency-linked account was created in May 2014, and for years, it just posted local headlines, accumulating some 19,000 followers by July 2016.
Another twist: These accounts apparently never spread misinformation. In fact, they posted real local news, serving as sleeper accounts building trust and readership for some future, unforeseen effort. "They set them up for a reason. And if at any given moment, they wanted to operationalize this network of what seemed to be local American news handles, they can significantly influence the narrative on a breaking news story," Schafer told NPR. "But now instead of just showing up online and flooding it with news sites, they have these accounts with two years of credible history."
Another twist: These accounts apparently never spread misinformation. In fact, they posted real local news, serving as sleeper accounts building trust and readership for some future, unforeseen effort. "They set them up for a reason. And if at any given moment, they wanted to operationalize this network of what seemed to be local American news handles, they can significantly influence the narrative on a breaking news story," Schafer told NPR. "But now instead of just showing up online and flooding it with news sites, they have these accounts with two years of credible history."
Good thing there isn't a major, national media group that controls a whole bunch of local news channels and can force them to run pre-written stories to push a political narrative. That would be awful!
=Smidge=
Why? To erode U.S. politics and disrupt NATO.
Russia's biggest restriction on expanding their influence has always been NATO. NATO's balls have been cut off without reliable American participation.
Someone ought to swing for this. As a cynic I know that powerful people often don't bear the consequences of their actions. But make no mistake, this is as much of an attack on America as 9/11 was.
Sinclair broadcast group owns many "local" stations, often multiple in a city. They force the "local" news shows to run their stories, commentators, and have the local hosts read corporate produced statements. They also force stations to run their national produced "news" shows like Full Measure.
They even run commercials about how independent and reliable local new is. It's funny to see these same ones on multiple stations.
I see every time this comes up that political process hacking is somehow not seen as a big deal, because injustice in the name of conservatism is somehow sacred and above such considerations.
Well, the digging won't stop. This isn't some 'Bengazi' investigation - this is about the heart of our election process, about how much influence foreign interference had.
I know that conservatives have power over the mechanisms of power now - and plenty of folks like that idea, and want it to continue at all costs. But if it comes at a cost of ignoring damage to our democracy, it won't be remembered well at all.
This is not going away.
None of these issues are going away.
Ryan Fenton
So you're claiming that additional evidence that Russia has an extensive framework set up to interfere with US democracy through manipulating citizens' knowledge and views somehow doesn't support the narrative that Putin influenced the 2016 US election through Facebook and Twitter posts? Sounds like you're too far gone to see the issue objectively.
Side note: The media hardly ever talked about Hillary. They spent most of their time feeding into an underdog story for (privileged self-professed billionaire) Trump. And, sadly, this country values naive "thinking from the gut" over well-thought-out plans from people with experience and a proven record. The difference in detail (how goals could be accomplished) of plans for the country listed on their campaign pages was laughable as if Donald didn't want to win from the start.
The lobbying system is absolutely a problem though. And people desperately wanted change. But hiring a rich grifter is not a very logical way to change that compared to electing a moderate liberal judge who could help overturn Citizens' United.