Joe.My.God. LGBT News
TechCrunch reports:
Twitter says a significant information operation involving hundreds of accounts linked to China were part of an effort to deliberately “sow political discord” in Hong Kong after weeks of protests in the region.
In a blog post, the social networking site said the 936 accounts it found tried to undermine “the legitimacy and political positions of the protest movement on the ground.”
Although Twitter is banned in China, the social media giant says the latest onslaught of fake accounts is likely “a coordinated state-backed operation.” “Specifically, we identified large clusters of accounts behaving in a coordinated manner to amplify messages related to the Hong Kong protests,” the statement said.
We’re disclosing coordinated account activity focused on the ongoing protest movement in Hong Kong. Our investigations have found that these accounts are linked to state-backed information operations from mainland China.https://t.co/Pc9R90Dp85
— Twitter Safety (@TwitterSafety) August 19, 2019
The accounts were proactively identified by our team & suspended for using coordinated attempts to manipulate the public conversation. We’re adding the relevant information to our archive of information operations — the largest of its kind in the industry.
— Twitter Safety (@TwitterSafety) August 19, 2019
These covert, manipulative behaviors have no place on our service — they violate the fundamental principles on which Twitter was built. We hope that we can empower further learning and public understanding of these nefarious behaviors that undermine the public conversation.
— Twitter Safety (@TwitterSafety) August 19, 2019
Both Twitter and Facebook now say they’ve found evidence of a major, coordinated disinformation campaign originating in China, aimed at destabilizing Hong Kong.
Twitter: https://t.co/d5OOi9Lxk7
Facebook: https://t.co/3XMPCpaCWR
— Will Oremus (@WillOremus) August 19, 2019
Breaking News: Facebook and Twitter accused China of spreading disinformation about the Hong Kong protests, shutting down numerous accounts tied to the government https://t.co/3p7cqRBZew
— The New York Times (@nytimes) August 19, 2019