Researchers find massive Anti-Russian bot army.

Consortium

A team of researchers at the University of Adelaide have found that as many as 80 percent of tweets about the 2022 Russia-Ukraine invasion in its early weeks were part of a covert propaganda campaign originating from automated fake “bot” accounts.

The Adelaide University researchers unearthed a massive organised pro-Ukraine influence operation underway from the early stages of the conflict. Overall, the study found automated “bot” accounts to be the source of between 60 to 80 percent of all tweets in the dataset. 

In other words if you are pushing anti-Russia talking points it has an 80% chance of being propaganda from a bot farm.

Before you scream "Russian propaganda!".

While the Stanford-Graphika and Meta research was produced by researchers who have long-term deep ties to the U.S. national security state, the Adelaide University researchers are remarkably independent. The academic team is from the university’s School of Mathematical Science.

An important note.

Nakasone said the U.S. has been conducting operations aimed at dismantling Russian propaganda. He said the operations were lawful, conducted through policy determined by the U.S. Defense Department and with civilian oversight.

An action that was illegal before the repeal of the Smith Mundt act.

The point of this thread is to get people to question the information they are spreading. Ask yourself is the information you are repeating helping escalate this conflict or de-escalate the conflict?

It's sad I have to reiterate this.
I oppose the invasion of Ukraine, but I also understand how we got here. I understand most nations on the globe would react like Russia given the circumstances. The only people I can really blame are the American bureaucrats who have been ignoring Russia's legitimate concerns for decades now.

This is not our fight!

A lot of American and British soldiers post on twitter to post on anti Russian posts.

a reply to: YongGua
Hello new account.
"beep boop"

#IStandWithUkraine hashtag was used in as many as 38,000 tweets each hour, rising to 50,000 tweets an hour by day three of the war. 

Most American military people I talk to want nothing to do with this conflict. It's the Call of duty NAFO idiots pushing for escalation.

a reply to: JAY1980

Excellent thread and a topic that should be sincerely looked at.

Even now, Twitter is one of the main sources for Ukrainian information.

a reply to: MykeNukem

Doesn't being a primary source implicate Twitter as a culprit of disinformation circulation?

a reply to: MykeNukem
It's actually quite entertaining to manipulate them on Twitter.

Post something pro-Russia with #istandwithukraine.

Then post something pro-Ukraine under #istandwithrussia.

It forces the bots into a feedback loop of sorts. No humans can tweet that fast...

Needless to say my Twitter feed is an absolute dumpster fire currently. But it's interesting nonetheless.

a reply to: JAY1980

This has been pretty rampant and not only in military conflicts. Everything I see in my field is the bs getting worse and not enough people care and none are actually doing much to push back all the lies.

You should not have to use lies if your stance is just, true, or moral. Bots is another argument if it's not bots +lies and manipulation.

The facade, lies and twisting of actual events is what will lead us to nuclear war or worse. The people saying bad Russia and pushing climate change are the ones who are going against nature and truth.

They either know something major we do not or they are just greedy and evil at this point.

a reply to: JAY1980

I was tempted, severely, to crack a terminator joke but ah well.

Seriously though it is well known that we have entered the age of information warfare, now this is nothing new as propaganda has existed since the year of zero so to speak but there are many nations in the world today geared up to wage an information war and in the age of the internet is a fact of life.

I personally am not anti-anything (well I hate the devil at least the principle of the devil that is and evil in general) but much of eastern Europe especially nations that were under soviet occupation and of course much of the west which was the victim of Continuus cold war and even post-cold war anti soviet propaganda and anti-socialist rhetoric much of it originating from the US since the McCarthy Era which of course gave rise to the age of McCarthyism.
en.wikipedia.org...

This infiltrated educational institutions around the world and when Soviet communism fell (it has to be said not only due to external actions by the west but also mostly because of growing internal inequality and over-expenditure on the Soviet military and internal secret police at the cost of the public services that the then trapped people really needed as well as the Stalinist version of communism which took away people's rights stepping well beyond what Lenin had originally intended under the Bolshevik extremism that came into power under Stalin's regime which despite so many ordinary Russians whom just voiced their dislike of the new system being murdered by Stalin's goon's as well as anyone else the local party gangster leader wanted dead - the Soviet communist party was NEVER the people in charge it as a bunch of Gangsters in Charge) was trumpeted as the failure of socialism when in fact Socialism actually NEVER failed, indeed it worked superbly in many Scandinavian countries (until they entered the EU and were influx'ed by migrants from mostly NON EU nations such as the huge influx of mostly non-European Moslems into Sweden - formerly a homogenous and mostly Christian nation - that has turned the country once one of the best living and most law abiding in the world on its head - well a cake is made from its ingredients and so is a nation) and throughout most of western Europe until the same mechanism that had been used to attack the Commies was turned against our own more moderate socialists, a mechanism that was keyed to mind control populations, subvert education to ensure socialist ideas did not spread and to bring down socialism even moderate socialism in all its forms.

But to replace it with what?

Neoliberalism, the true enemy of Democracy, SMALL GOVERNMENT means your vote is worthless as whoever gets into power is a puppet of the elite and Corporations rule the one world, they want to usher in.

Reduction in people's rights (Something SOCIAL reformers the root of Socialism always fought for and laid down their lives to achieve in so many nations long before Communism even came about.

Now we face a new form of Totalitarianism that will be very like the worst days of the communist system for us but perhaps even worse, the elite are now the Party and the Party like in soviet Russia aims to own everything, note the Party not the people, the Elite not the Communist party but ultimately it is the same in the end, corruption at the top and poverty and suffering below.

Slavery.

One world government is the ENEMY of freedom, the ENEMY of the people.

In this Putin is just another creep like Stalin and all he wants to do is create his own tiny but independent version of the NWO, one with him in charge of a re-imagined Soviet Union.

But one good thing can be said about this, it is at least a temporary wrench in the works of the NWO, WEF etc.

originally posted by: TzarChasm
a reply to: MykeNukem

Doesn't being a primary source implicate Twitter as a culprit of disinformation circulation?

Likely unwillingly.
Let's see if the new CEO will take the time away from panhandling for "$8" to look into this.

Declassified Australia contacted Twitter to ask what action they may have taken to remove the fake bot accounts identified in the University of Adelaide research. They had not responded by the time of going to press.

a reply to: JAY1980

Probably a multiple returning previously banned one?

a reply to: Oldcarpy2
Nope...

Twitter won't be unbanning people until "content counsel" convenes.

a reply to: JAY1980

Ahem. I meant on ATS?

originally posted by: Oldcarpy2
a reply to: JAY1980

Ahem. I meant on ATS?

Ooh my bad.

You were referring to the first person(sic bot) that replied to my OP 7 minutes after posting. Clearly not reading the article and with nothing of relevance to contribute to the thread.

That new/old member?

a reply to: JAY1980

Yep. Used to be Yellowriver or somesuch and similar before the trip ban hammer struck.......

originally posted by: TzarChasm
a reply to: MykeNukem

Doesn't being a primary source implicate Twitter as a culprit of disinformation circulation?

Yes, yes, I would think that is the case, whether they know it or not.

Good observation.

For clarity, I said "one of the main" sources, not the "primary", there is a difference.

Other than that, yes i agree.

a reply to: Oldcarpy2
Interesting...

I have somehow managed to not get banned after 13 years, yet 90% of what I do here is trolling...

Regardless YongGua is most likely not a returning member they are clearly here for 1 thing.Post History

Note the 2 or 1 minute intervals between posts.

The study also says :

Pro-Russian non-bot accounts are most influential overall, with information flows to a variety of other account groups

#IStandWithPutin versus #IStandWithUkraine: The interaction of bots and humans in discussion of the Russia/Ukraine war


#IStandWithPutin versus #IStandWithUkraine: The interaction of bots and humans in discussion of the Russia/Ukraine war


Bots manipulate public opinion in Russia-Ukraine conflict


And of cource there has been also pro-Putin bot`s


Twitter bot network amplifying Russian disinformation about Ukraine war, researcher says


Twitter is being gamed into boosting pro-Russia hashtags. Who’s behind them?

*** Closed - pending staff review ***