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Publisher: NATO Strategic Communications Centre of Excellence

Result 41-60 of 98
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INTERNET TROLLING AS A TOOL OF HYBRID WARFARE: THE CASE OF LATVIA

INTERNET TROLLING AS A TOOL OF HYBRID WARFARE: THE CASE OF LATVIA

Author(s): Alexander Fokin / Language(s): English / Publication Year: 2016

Social media has been used increasingly to support military actions. Recent conflicts have demonstrated that the fight for hearts and minds is as important as kinetic activity, and social media plays a crucial role in this process. Both state and non-state actors effectively exploit social media to gain support for their actions, recruit new members, deceive and intimidate the adversary, and even use it for traditional military activities such as intelligence collection or command and control. Given these conditions, the NATO Strategic Communication Centre of Excellence (NATO StratCom COE) was tasked to conduct a study on how social media can be used as a weapon of hybrid warfare. The recent Russian-Ukrainian conflict demonstrated how fake identities and accounts were used to disseminate narratives through social media, blogs, and web commentaries in order to manipulate, harass, or deceive opponents. Several reports by investigative journalists have reported about the existence of so called troll farms in Russian cities, employing people to spread disinformation, rumours, or falsified facts, enter into discussions and flood topic-related web spaces with their own messages or abuse. Nevertheless, trolling is still a relatively unexplored phenomenon. Although such activities have been widely identified, their effects have not been measured, particularly due to the fact that is it difficult to distinguish between the paid trolls and people who are simply expressing their opinions. In order to analyse how pro-Russian trolling is used to influence the public opinion in NATOmember countries the NATO StratCom COE commissioned the study Internet Trolling as a Tool of Hybrid Warfare: the Case of Latvia. The study was conducted by the Latvian Institute of International Affairs in cooperation with Riga Stradins University, and was aimed at analysing organised proRussian trolling in internet media to measure its impact on public opinion in Latvia. Latvia was chosen for the case study due to the specifics of its information environment (a strong division between the Latvian and Russian language information spaces), as well as the country’s historical background and potentially vulnerability to Russian hybrid warfare tactics. Communication science, social anthropology, political science, and information technology expertise was employed to gain a better understanding of the trolling phenomenon, and to develop methods to identify trolling and evaluate its impact on public opinion. Both quantitative and qualitative research methods were used. This research provides an opportunity to evaluate the risk potential of trolling, and it offers recommendations on how to mitigate the effects of trolling when used as a tool in hybrid warfare, beyond the specific case study.

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IRAN’S PROXY WAR IN YEMEN: THE INFORMATION WARFARE LANDSCAPE

IRAN’S PROXY WAR IN YEMEN: THE INFORMATION WARFARE LANDSCAPE

Author(s): Mariam Fekry,Can Kasapoglu / Language(s): English / Publication Year: 2020

The Yemeni conflict has been witnessing essential information warfare and propaganda front. Since the beginning of the conflict, the Houthi movement has been aware of the importance of the internet. Notably, they avoid adopting an aggressive sectarian lexicon on social media. Instead, following drone and missile strikes, the Houthi-associated accounts frequently emphasize IRGC-assisted game-changing military capabilities. This focus seems to follow Iranian priorities in Yemen, namely promoting the militarized political movement and portraying it in a less sectarian but more patriotic and battle-hardened fashion. This approach likely emanates from the different characteristics of the Shia faith in Yemen compared with the rest of the Middle East.

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MALICIOUS USE OF SOCIAL MEDIA: CASE STUDIES FROM BBC MONITORING

MALICIOUS USE OF SOCIAL MEDIA: CASE STUDIES FROM BBC MONITORING

Author(s): Olga Robinson / Language(s): English / Publication Year: 2019

BBC Monitoring (BBCM) is a specialist unit within BBC News that tracks thousands of international media outlets, including hard-to-reach broadcast sources, to report news from and about the world’s media and social media. Set up at the outbreak of World War II with the primary purpose of informing the War Office about propaganda by Nazi-controlled media, BBCM has a long history of tackling disinformation and misleading reporting. Over the past 79 years, the service has translated, explained, and interpreted media messages, from the broadcast propaganda of the Cold War to the multi-platform campaigns of today. The rise of social networks and instant messaging platforms has ushered in a new and fast-changing era for open-source media monitoring. Today, BBCM still relies on its detailed knowledge of media sources and behavior along with linguistic, regional, and cultural expertise to navigate the increasingly complex and muddled information space. In addition, it uses a range of tools for social media analysis, and continues to explore ways of using evolving technology to improve its journalists’ ability to track multiple sources and spot media manipulation. BBCM this year launched a new dedicated disinformation team, whose primary purpose is to spot, collate, and investigate examples of misleading reporting and manipulation, drawing on BBCM’s overall monitoring of global media. This report shows some of the disinformation techniques and tactics that BBCM journalists have come across in their recent work, and outlines the approach adopted by BBCM to rise to the challenges of disinformation in the 21st century.

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MANIPULATION ECOSYSTEM OF SOCIAL MESSAGING PLATFORMS

MANIPULATION ECOSYSTEM OF SOCIAL MESSAGING PLATFORMS

Author(s): Marina Paramonova,Rueban Manokara / Language(s): English / Publication Year: 2020

Social messaging platforms started as analternative to the Short Messaging Service (SMS), pitching themselves as faster and cheaper, with additional features such as the ability to send documents and media securely. These features granted users a level of encryption that meant no third party, including the messaging services themselves, was able to read the messages sent. Today, social messaging platforms account for a combined 4.1 billion users and social messaging has become the most frequent activity a person carries out online. Similarly to major social media platforms that are being artificially inflated and manipulated for financial and political gain, social messaging platforms are equally vulnerable to the threat of exploitation.

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MAPPING EXTREMIST COMMUNITIES: A SOCIAL NETWORK ANALYSIS APPROACH

MAPPING EXTREMIST COMMUNITIES: A SOCIAL NETWORK ANALYSIS APPROACH

Author(s): Author Not Specified / Language(s): English / Publication Year: 2020

Online social networks are used by everyone in our everyday lives, including by malicious actors and organisations. Previous work has characterised the specific online behaviour of Middle East-based terror groups. However, this behaviour is constantly evolving, as a response to events such as the battle of Mosul and also due to the strengthening of the platforms’ moderation rules. Terror groups target social media platforms such as Twitter, Telegram, and Discord, and while their past behavioural patterns and narrative strategies have been well documented, the adaptive nature of these groups require continuous analysis of their online presence.

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MAPPING OF STRATCOM PRACTICES IN NATO COUNTRIES - RESULTS OF THE STUDY

MAPPING OF STRATCOM PRACTICES IN NATO COUNTRIES - RESULTS OF THE STUDY

Author(s): Gerry Osborne / Language(s): English / Publication Year: 2015

“There is a curious dichotomy concerning StratCom in the NATO Alliance and in its membership nations. The term occupies an inordinately larger space in verbiage and documents than the function is given in the environments in which it is has the most potential to effect. This most recent study not only re-affirms previous results but more importantly, attempts to add to them by seeking to get to the “why”. While it does get to the “why”, the integrity of the results is somewhat diminished by the disappointing level of national participation with only 11 of 28 nations responding. For a function often on the lips of leadership -- both in the Alliance and its nations -- it is rather telling that 17 nations passed over the opportunity to illuminate the function and contribute to the discussion. Nevertheless, the report builds on the baseline understanding of how Allied nations define, organise and implement the StratCom function, and the results are as encouraging as they are concerning. Concerning because the author found that many responding nations still consider Strategic Communication to essentially be another name for what they formerly termed Public Affairs. Encouraging because the authors found that many nations acknowledged that the StratCom function needed to change from a supporting to a supported role – an understanding which is finding traction amongst experienced operators. Having previously written a paper which included Alliance nation mapping with respect to StratCom, I welcome this report for updating and contributing more to NATO’s understanding about how its membership individually considers StratCom. It gives needed insight into NATO policy development on behalf of all nations.”

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MAPPING OF STRATCOM PRACTICES IN THE NATO COUNTRIES

MAPPING OF STRATCOM PRACTICES IN THE NATO COUNTRIES

Author(s): Specified No Author / Language(s): English / Publication Year: 2015

The findings consist of analysis of the questionnaire results filled in by 11 NATO nations and structured interviews with 6 NATO nations during the first half of 2015.

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MITIGATING DISINFORMATION IN SOUTHEAST ASIAN ELECTIONS: LESSONS FROM INDONESIA, PHILIPPINES AND THAILAND

MITIGATING DISINFORMATION IN SOUTHEAST ASIAN ELECTIONS: LESSONS FROM INDONESIA, PHILIPPINES AND THAILAND

Author(s): Jonathan Corpus Ong,Ross Tapsell,Duncan McCargo,Thaweeporn Kummetha,Virot Ali,Sebastian Bay / Language(s): English / Publication Year: 2020

In 2019, a series of elections in the Southeast Asian countries of Indonesia, the Philippines, and Thailand highlighted the salience of digital media in political campaigns and insidious modes of electoral manipulation. Despite new legal, technical, social, and educational efforts to mitigate “fake news,” our comparative research analysis of elections in the three countries observes that digital disinformation has become further entrenched in electoral processes. We observe that a wider range of political actors and parties enlisted a diversity of digital campaign specialists and paid out “buzzers” (Indonesia), “trolls” (Philippines), and “IOs (information operations)” (Thailand) to circulate manipulative narratives discrediting their political opponents. Some politicians even fanned the flames of religious (Indonesia/Thailand) and ethnic conflict (all three) in their communities in a desperate bid to score votes.

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NETWORK OF TERROR: HOW DAESH USES ADAPTIVE SOCIAL NETWORKS TO SPREAD ITS MESSAGE

NETWORK OF TERROR: HOW DAESH USES ADAPTIVE SOCIAL NETWORKS TO SPREAD ITS MESSAGE

Author(s): Joseph Shaheen / Language(s): English / Publication Year: 2015

We conducted research aimed at understanding the process by which DAESH disseminates propaganda online. Our focus was not the content that is distributed but the method by which it is distributed. We did so using a number of qualitative, statistical, and numerical analysis techniques in hopes of gaining a deeper insight into their operations and making recommendations for NATO and NATO member states on how to combat them effectively. We discovered a number of important findings the most salient of which is on how individual level decisions made by many of their members have contributed to the survival of their propaganda capabilities, and in some instances an advanced ability to thwart efforts to eliminate their message and their outreach to both locals as well as westerners. We can summarize our findings as follows: • Popular social media platforms such as, and especially, Twitter forms the core of DAESH’s propaganda and information dissemination efforts. They use these mediums as the core of a web of content that is spread in many parts of the ungoverned internet. • DAESH (perhaps unknowingly) uses and an adaptive network structure on Twitter to combat outside influences and to react to external operations seeking to curb their operations. This network adapts at high speed and with limited central organization. • DAESH makes innovative use of platform vulnerabilities that allows them to evade detection, suspension and deletion by state and non-state actors through both automated and manual methods of detection. • DAESH has amassed a strong following supported by an internal dedicated human infrastructure allowing them to affect a substantial impact on the information environment. • Through the use of a core-periphery network structure and a high number of networkcentral actors DAESH created a redundancy factor that can withstand repeated efforts to disrupt their information supply chain. • Through the use of account inflation, signaling, and closure methods, DAESH has been able to successfully create friend/ follow networks that feed into their ability to build sustainable adaptive networks, evade detection, and maintain their level of online activity. • DAESH has built a network structure that utilizes the flexibility of small communal networks and allows for the large scale interactions commonly associated with large diverse-use networks. This adds to the challenge of combating them in the traditional information warfare environment. • We create an explanatory process to simplify the reader’s understanding of the group’s usage of social media. We call it the DEER process. The DEER process begins with dissemination and ends with replenishment. We recommend this model as a way to build more effective strategies in combating the group. Our findings lead us to a more detailed understanding of the DAESH propaganda machine which has gained them notoriety throughout the world and especially on traditional media platforms; and though our conclusions are technical in nature, they have far reaching policy implications. To begin, these conclusions illustrate the ineffectiveness and inefficiencies of a distributed response to DAESH propaganda. DAESH uses limited centralization from a network perspective in order to evade detection while maintaining some control over method and content of their messages—a hybrid model—where flexibility and potency are both achievable. This means that substantial resources must be dedicated in order to combat their ideology effectively. These resources (human and otherwise) are, at the moment, non-aligned, ineffective, and unsustainable over the long term. This is not because the resources and methods used are by nature ineffective, but because the adversary is using strategies and tactics which have never been encountered on this scale ever before. For example, in this report we show that the targeting of highly visible active accounts on Twitter for deletion or suspension, though can eliminate short terms gains by the group, also provides them with the time and knowledge to build more adaptive, responsive networks. While, if account targeting is based on a community/clustering method, we can increase the transaction costs of our adversary’s recovery substantially—gaining invaluable time pinned on lower levels of propaganda diffusion— and simultaneously building more strategic operational tactics. We propose and recommend that in addition to the adjustments of technical methods used in the targeting of DAESH network infrastructure, that more emphasis should be placed on disrupting the supply chain of propaganda, rather on providing contrasting messages. This implies that permanent investments not only in new technology, but in human resources should be made, and coordinated labor division among NATO members as well as allies in the region should be instituted. Our discoveries rely on a number of assumptions to produce our recommendations—the most important of which—is that this information battle is based on concepts of adaptive networks and complex systems. This is a direct result of DAESH’s approach of relating loose policies to its members and allowing them to make individual level behavioral decisions on how best to conduct an information war. In turn, this means that traditional methods as have been adopted by various agencies, state, and non-state actors alike simply will and do not suffice, as has been evident from the group’s continual ability to conduct a propaganda war while facing insurmountable opposition, both physical and electronic. We also recommend that more effort must be made to remove the value proposition which DAESH uses to attract recruits to begin with. Though, our research did not engage the socioeconomic and geo-political environment under which potential recruits are subjected, we hypothesize that innovative efforts in this space can produce substantial declines in DAESH’s ability to disseminate propaganda and ultimately to recruit westerners to their cause. Finally, we make recommendations for future and ongoing research, some of which is much needed to understand and produce effective strategies to combat the group.

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NEW TRENDS IN SOCIAL MEDIA

NEW TRENDS IN SOCIAL MEDIA

Author(s): Beata Bialy,Sanda Svetoka / Language(s): English / Publication Year: 2016

In the current media landscape, social media has taken on a very prominent role. It has evolved into a mainstream information channel and developed into a new online platform through which people organise their lives. Social media influences almost every aspect of human interaction, and the online and offline worlds are increasingly merging. Social media has become one of the main channels through which people connect and communicate, as well as getting news, however as the technology develops, social media consumption habits and communication models are also changing unpredictably, both in terms of speed and direction. Social media has also emerged as a powerful weapon, used more and more frequently in information warfare. Since its development in the early 2000s, social media has become an important tool for influencing people’s attitudes, beliefs and behaviour. Both states and terrorist groups are exploiting social media platforms effectively and experimenting with the engagement techniques and types of content that best achieve their political or military goals. In order to be better prepared for this rapidly changing information environment, the Polish National Ministry of Defence requested that the NATO StratCom Centre of Excellence explore the current trends in social media, analyse its potential development in the future, including usage patterns, models of communication and engagement techniques. This report is the outcome of that request and will seek to: - Identify social media trends in types of platform and content. - Analyse usage patterns. - Analyse the expectations from the further opportunities social media offers NATO and its member states. - Discuss the threats and opportunities presented by the use of social media, as well as analyse current gaps in NATO’s communications via social media. - Develop recommendations on how to further improve current communication techniques in order to support the strategic communication needs of governments, armed forces and NATO in the future. The report summarises the conclusions of the expert seminar New Trends in Social Media, organised in Riga on 18-19 April 2016 by NATO StratCom COE. The seminar attracted more than 50 communication practitioners, industry representatives and academics. The report includes social media usage statistics and a literature review, as well as lessons learned from the communication efforts during recent NATO exercises. Finally, it presents the main outcome from the survey carried out by NATO StratCom COE on the perception, understanding and use of social media by NATO communication personnel.

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NUCLEAR ENERGY AND THE CURRENT SECURITY ENVIRONMENT IN THE ERA OF HYBRID THREATS

NUCLEAR ENERGY AND THE CURRENT SECURITY ENVIRONMENT IN THE ERA OF HYBRID THREATS

Author(s): Specified No Author / Language(s): English / Publication Year: 2019

Security concerns are an integral part of the discussions on energy dependencies. The security discussion became even more common in the European energy debates with the various gas disputes between Russia and Ukraine in 2006–2015. After these incidents, the energy diversification policy has received increasing attention in Europe. Russia has featured prominently in the European debate relating to energy dependencies and interdependencies, but there are also other actors who may have an interest in affecting the stability of the energy supply. This has been the case with hydrocarbon production and exports in particular (Oxenstierna, 2014). Recent attacks on oil tankers and an oil processing facility in Saudi Arabia have made headlines and resulted in rapid fluctuations in the price of oil. Nuclear energy has attracted much less attention as a potential security risk compared to the perception of risks related to hydrocarbon dependency, and it is therefore worth taking a closer look at the sector. Different energy sources, industries and actors must be studied more carefully in the changed security environment. These changes include the growing dependencies across energy infrastructure systems, increasing interconnectedness in the world, the increased potential to use energy as a geo-political tool and the intensifying competition among great powers and regional hegemons (Verner, et al., 2019). The objective of this study is to analyse whether nuclear energy can be used in some way by an adversary as a part of their hybrid activity toolbox.

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POLITICS AND PROFIT IN THE FAKE NEWS FACTORY

POLITICS AND PROFIT IN THE FAKE NEWS FACTORY

FOUR WORK MODELS OF POLITICAL TROLLING IN THE PHILIPPINES

Author(s): Jonathan Corpus Ong,Jason Vincent Cabañes / Language(s): English / Publication Year: 2019

The Philippines represents a national context where disinformation is becoming ever more entrenched into the political system, in spite of global attention and investment in the fight against fake news. Three years ago, a toxic election campaign headlined by misogynistic rape jokes, false papal endorsements, and imposter news websites ended with a surprise outcome that upended the entire political establishment. In the May 2019 midterm election, new interventions such as platform bans, fact-check partnerships, and digital advertising rules were introduced to curb the spread of similar tactics. Recent research discovered, however, that the digital disinformation industry has only further expanded and flourished, with digital operators controlling a more substantial chunk of the political campaign war chest.

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PROTECTING ELECTIONS: A STRATEGIC COMMUNICATIONS APPROACH

PROTECTING ELECTIONS: A STRATEGIC COMMUNICATIONS APPROACH

Author(s): Sebastian Bay,Guna Šnore / Language(s): English / Publication Year: 2019

By participating in free and fair elections, citizens make their choice while they expect the officials they elect to represent their best interests in the best possible way. The voters’ choice gives legitimacy to the officials and parties needed to handle legislation and execute political powers in the way they find most appropriate and suitable. While the competition for political power is an essential element in ensuring the democratic diversity of interests, the election process itself can become exposed to malicious influence attempts, including foreign powers aiming to influence the choice of voters as well as the outcome of an election.

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REDEFINING EURO-ATLANTIC VALUES: RUSSIA`S MANIPULATIVE TECHNIQUE

REDEFINING EURO-ATLANTIC VALUES: RUSSIA`S MANIPULATIVE TECHNIQUE

Author(s): Elīna Lange-Ionatamišvili / Language(s): English / Publication Year: 2017

Since November 2013, when the uprising of the Ukrainian nation set in motion a wide spectrum of events and political process, researchers and policy makers have been questioning the reasoning, consequences, and international implications of those political processes, as well as their impact on the future of the international political environment. This study, Redefining Euro-Atlantic Values: Russia`s Manipulative Techniques, is not one of the many investigations published in recent months focusing on Russian information warfare in Ukraine. It is not a study about them. This is a study about us, namely, the ‘transatlantic community’—a community we consider to be based on democratic values. This study seeks to answer an essential question: how can it be that countries, which enjoy leading positions in terms of prosperity, freedom, solidarity, innovation, economic competitiveness, and seemingly unlimited normative power based on the long-standing democratic traditions have neglected or ignored (intentionally and unintentionally) the manipulative redefinition of their core democratic values. By allowing our core democratic values to be deconstructed and reconstituted by values derived from an authoritarian regime makes Western society vulnerable to influence. Russia’s international ambitions are not based on conquering new territories, but on creating mental landscapes susceptible to political manipulation. Russia’s foreign policy goals with regard to the West are clear: ‘to weaken the West economically, to split it politically, and to establish Russia as the hegemonic power on the European continent’1 . Extensive material resources are unnecessary; individuals and societies that question themselves are decisive ‘weapons’ in the battle for influence. Transitioning out of the international relationships that dominated during the Cold War was an eye- and mind-opening exercise for both governments and societies. Most of the countries that left the Soviet bloc, including the Baltic States, joined those that are based on democratic values; however some keep their old values, fashionably redressed in a style called ‘sovereign democracy’.

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RESPONDING TO COGNITIVE SECURITY CHALLENGE

RESPONDING TO COGNITIVE SECURITY CHALLENGE

Author(s): Sebastian Bay,Nora Biteniece,Giorgio Bertolin,Edward Christie,Anton Dek,Rolf E. Fredheim,John D. Gallacher,Kateryna Kononova,Tatyana Marchenko / Language(s): English / Publication Year: 2019

This research product is a collection of different efforts, united by a common goal: to identify some of the most critical security challenges in online environment and what can be done to counter them, and to determine the role of governments and state institutions in countering them. People spend increasing amounts of time online, either communicating, networking, entertaining themselves, or obtaining news. On the one hand, this narrows the number of places analysts must look at when assessing the information environment, on the other, we have yet to fully tap into the analysis potential for this enormous space and leverage it to increase the effectiveness of our communications.

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RISKS AND VULNERABILITIES IN THE WESTERN BALKANS

RISKS AND VULNERABILITIES IN THE WESTERN BALKANS

Author(s): Rufin Zamfir / Language(s): English / Publication Year: 2020

The Western Balkans (WB) have come into the international spotlight as an arena for big power competition. In their foreign policy orientation, the region’s six countries — Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina (BiH), Kosovo, Montenegro, North Macedonia, and Serbia — all share Euro-Atlantic affiliations, although the degree of affiliation varies. Internally, functional and structural weaknesses — whether Albania’s legacy of an isolationist communist dictatorship or the consequence of the violent dissolution of Yugoslavia in the other countries—open doors for hostile foreign actors to project their influence. The environment is rife with ethnic tension, border disputes, and neighbourly disagreements. All of these countries are developing democracies that have yet to fully recover from the aftermath of the Yugoslav wars. Their Euro-Atlantic orientation is currently a matter of tense debate. While Albania, Montenegro and North Macedonia have become NATO members, Serbia oscillates between East and West, its EU candidate status notwithstanding. Although EU membership is still uncertain for the Western Balkan countries, all six have expressed their willingness to join the Union but are advancing down this path at different speeds.

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ROBOTROLLING (2017-1)

ROBOTROLLING (2017-1)

Author(s): Specified No Author / Language(s): English / Publication Year: 2017

Two in three Twitter users who write in Russian about the NATO presence in Eastern Europe are robotic or ‘bot’ accounts. Together, these accounts created 84% of the total Russian-language messages. The English language space is also heavily affected: 1 in 4 active accounts were likely automated and were responsible for 46% of all English-language content. Of the four states considered—Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, and Poland—Estonia has disproportionately frequently been targeted by bots, whereas Poland and Lithuania have seen the least automated activity. Our impression is that Twitter in Russian is policed less effectively than it is in English. Despite the high presence of automated activity, the period considered saw no large-scale, coordinated robotic campaigns. The vast majority of bot activity is apolitical spam. For this reason, the polluted state of Twitter conversations about the NATO presence may be indicative of Twitter as a whole. The implications are stark: the democratising possibilities of social media appear—at least in the case of Twitter in Russia—to have been greatly undermined. The findings presented have practical implications for any policy maker, journalist, or analyst who measures activity on Twitter. Failure to account for bot activity will—at best—result in junk statistics. This is the first issue of ‘Robotrolling’, a regular product about automation in social media published quarterly by NATO StratCom COE.

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ROBOTROLLING 1/2019

ROBOTROLLING 1/2019

Author(s): Specified No Author / Language(s): English / Publication Year: 2019

This report presents top-level findings from the first research project to systematically track and measure the scale of inauthentic activity on the Russian social network VK. On VK, a vocal core consisting of loyal news media, pro-Kremlin groups, and bots and trolls dominates the conversation about NATO. The volume of material from this core group is such, that overall genuine users account for only of 14% of the total number of messages about NATO in the Baltic States and Poland. The spread of demonstrably fake content can offer a starting point for measuring how social media manipulation impacts genuine conversations. In the case of one story about a fictitious Finnish blogger, our algorithm estimates that at least 80% of users who shared the fake story were authentic. This quarter, messages appeared in more than 2 000 different group pages on VK. Setting aside messages from group pages, 37% of VK posts came from ‘bot’ accounts—software that mimics human behavior online. This level of activity is comparable to what we have seen on Russian-language Twitter. Unlike on Twitter, where the vast majority of human-controlled accounts are operated anonymously, on VK most accounts are likely to be authentic. Western social media companies have belatedly taken an active role in reducing the reach of the Kremlin’s social media manipulation efforts. However, it remains hard for researchers to evaluate the effectiveness of these measures on platforms such as Facebook and Instagram. In this context, VK offers a cautionary view of a network with minimal privacy, regulation, and moderation.

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ROBOTROLLING 1/2020

ROBOTROLLING 1/2020

Author(s): Specified No Author / Language(s): English / Publication Year: 2020

Inauthentic English- and Russian-language conversations on Twitter about the NATO presence in Poland and the Baltic States peaked on 4 and 5 December, respectively, coinciding with the 2019 NATO Leaders’ Meeting in London. Robotic accounts focused heavily on the meeting this quarter, particularly on English-language Twitter, which saw roughly 3 times the usual level of bot activity. On VK, an anomalous increase in activity from anonymous human-controlled accounts coincided with the meeting. Due to the contentious atmosphere surrounding the meeting in London, a considerable increase in the proportion of posts generated by bots was observed on English-language Twitter this quarter. At the same time, Russian-language bot activity on Twitter decreased to the lowest level observed thus far. In this issue of Robotrolling, we dig deeply into a sample of political pages amassed by a COE report on commercial social media manipulation in order to identify patterns in inauthentic activity on Facebook. We demonstrate that the 2019 elections in Ukraine were the primary focus of actors willing to pay for inflated social media engagement. Our analysis also reveals several shared traits among political manipulators on Facebook and provides a network visualisation that shows the connections between them. As a new year of Robotrolling begins, we review trends observed in VK groups over the past 18 months. A steady reduction in the proportion of content shared in communities dedicated to the so-called Novorossia region and the Donbass coincides with inauthentic content increasingly being posted in community spaces such as private groups or pages.

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ROBOTROLLING 2/2018

ROBOTROLLING 2/2018

Author(s): Specified No Author / Language(s): English / Publication Year: 2018

Anonymous users stole the show this quarter. Never before have we observed such high levels of activity from anonymous accounts. At the same time, bot activity in Russian-language conversations about NATO activity in the Baltics and Poland has emerged from its winter slumber. In the wake of the Skripal poisonings in the UK in March, Russian-language bot and anonymous activity about NATO more than doubled. Mentions of NATO on VK, in contrast, have been stable and declining during the whole period. Social media companies are working to end platform misuse. But malicious activity is evolving. Today, anonymous accounts are dominating the conversation. These accounts are either operated manually, or they have become advanced enough to fool human observers. The responses from open and free societies to the problem of online malicious activity have neither been strong enough, nor consistent enough. Figures presented in this issue reveal a disparity between the conversation quality in English and Russian-language spaces. Currently, the Russian-language conversation about NATO in the Baltics and Poland has six times the proportion of content from bot and anonymous accounts. As Twitter has taken steps to remove bots, the disparity has only widened. We assess that 93% of Russian-language accounts in our dataset are operated anonymously or automatically. In no way does this conversation mirror opinions of citizens. Journalists, policy makers, and advertisers take note!

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