Twitter and Meta delete accounts spreading Western propaganda
‘A web of accounts used deceptive tactics to promote Western narratives in the Middle East and Asia’
THE tech companies Twitter and Meta have shut dozens of accounts linked to a pro-us propaganda campaign in the first case of its kind, researchers claim.
Facebook, Instagram and Twitter users in the Middle East and Asia were targeted by a network of covert accounts that disseminated Western perspectives on international politics, including Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, a report by social media analytics firm Graphika and Stanford University found. Dozens of accounts featuring fake personas with digitally created photos were removed in July and August.
Experts said the web of accounts on Facebook and Instagram, which are owned by Meta, as well as on Twitter and five other platforms, “used deceptive tactics” and was “the most extensive case of covert pro-western influence operations on social media to be reviewed and analysed by opensource researchers to date”.
The researchers said Twitter identified the US and UK as the “countries of origin”, while Meta said the US was “the country of origin”. While the firms are accustomed to tackling Russian and Chinese propaganda, Meta said it was the first time it has removed a foreignfocused network promoting the US.
Some created users had tried to start hashtag campaigns. Others pretended to be independent media organisations.
Accounts in the scheme were set up more than five years ago and targeted users in different languages.
In one campaign aimed at Central Asia, accounts praised US aid and criticised Russia for engaging in “imperialist wars” in Africa and Syria, and for the deaths of civilians in Ukraine.
Elsewhere, accounts criticised Iranian authorities and highlighted the lack of women’s rights. Researchers said that a “web of accounts on Twitter, Facebook, Instagram and five other social media platforms used deceptive tactics to promote pro-western narratives in the Middle East and Central Asia”.
Twitter said the accounts fell foul of its policies on “platform manipulation and spam”, while Meta – Mark Zuckerberg’s company that owns Facebook, Instagram and Whatsapp – said the assets on its platforms engaged in “coordinated inauthentic behaviour”.
However, researchers said that the accounts’ activities did not appear to have a significant impact.
“The data shows the limitations of using inauthentic tactics to generate engagement and build influence online,” they noted. “The vast majority of posts and tweets we reviewed received no more than a handful of likes or retweets.”
Patrick Ryder, the Pentagon press secretary, said in a statement that the Defence Department would “look into and assess any information that Facebook provides”.