WASHINGTON – Organized efforts to manipulate social media and publicopinion are being carried out in at least 70 countries by governmentagencies and political parties, researchers said Thursday.
A report by the Oxford Internet Institute found manipulation efforts havedoubled over the past two years and are being used by both democratic andauthoritarian governments.
The study found Facebook remains “the platform of choice” for social mediamanipulation, with evidence seen in 56 countries.
The researchers said “sophisticated state actors” from at least sevencountries are working outside their borders on global foreign influenceoperations, using Facebook and Twitter.
The report identified the countries as China, India, Iran, Pakistan,Russia, Saudi Arabia and Venezuela.
“The manipulation of public opinion over social media remains a criticalthreat to democracy, as computational propaganda becomes a pervasive partof everyday life,” said Philip Howard, director of the British-basedinstitute.
“Although propaganda has always been a part of politics, the wide-rangingscope of these campaigns raises critical concerns for modern democracy.”
The report highlights broad growth in social media manipulation since the2016 US election and Brexit referendum where these techniques were firstnoted.
The researchers found evidence of organized social media manipulationcampaigns in 70 countries in 2019, up from 48 in 2018 and 28 in 2017.
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“In each country, there is at least one political party or governmentagency using social media to shape public attitudes domestically,” thereport said.
The Oxford researchers found politicians and political parties have beenamassing fake followers or spreading manipulated media in 45 democracies.
In 26 authoritarian states, government entities “have used computationalpropaganda as a tool of information control to suppress public opinion andpress freedom, discredit criticism and oppositional voices, and drown outpolitical dissent,” the researchers wrote.
The study found China had become “a major player in the globaldisinformation order” and has moved beyond its domestic platforms such asWeibo, WeChat, and QQ to services such as Facebook, Twitter, and YouTube.
Samantha Bradshaw, lead author of the report. said many countries aretaking advantage of the same social platforms that were used bypro-democracy activists several years earlier.
“Although social media was once heralded as a force for freedom anddemocracy, it has increasingly come under scrutiny for its role inamplifying disinformation, inciting violence, and lowering trust in themedia and democratic institutions,” Bradshaw said. -APP/AFP
