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Google Search Results Listings Can Be Manipulated For Propaganda (zdnet.com)

A feature of the Google search engine lets threat actors alter search results in a way that could be used to push political propaganda, oppressive views, or promote fake news. From a report: The feature is known as the "knowledge panel" and is a box that usually appears at the right side of the search results, usually highlighting the main search result for a very specific query. For example, searching for Barack Obama would bring a box showing information from Barack Obama's Wikipedia page, along with links to the former president's social media profiles. But Wietze Beukema, a member of PwC's Cyber Threat Detection & Response team, has discovered that you can hijack these knowledge panels and add them to any search query, sometimes in a way that pushes legitimate search results way down the page, highlighting an incorrect result and making it look legitimate. The way this can be done is by first searching for a legitimate item, and pressing the "share" icon that appears inside a knowledge panel.

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  1. Re:/. Submissions can be manipulated for propogand by nwaack · · Score: 1, Troll

    Despite the last sentence being an obvious troll, the rest of this is pretty spot on. When Obama and his minions took advantage of the internet to help win the election, he was declared a super-genius for doing so and most of the left would've happily felaciated the internet if it were a physical being. But as soon as Trump won...ORANGE MAN BAD, so INTERNET BAD TOO!!!