“Chinese network of fake accounts targets Trump with English-language videos”

WaPo:

A network of fake Chinese accounts has been posting videos bashing President Trump, criticizing his recent closure of China’s consulate in Houston, his handling of the coronavirus pandemic and his threats to ban the popular social media app TikTok, according to research published Wednesday.

The network is technologically advanced — using artificial intelligence to create faked faces for profile images — and nimble, producing videos at a pace of roughly one per day since mid-July. One video responded directly to a speech by Secretary of State Mike Pompeo calling for an Internet “clean” of malign Chinese influence less than 36 hours after he made a speech on the subject last week.

One three-minute video posted on YouTube by the network on Tuesday, titled “When I voted for trump, I almost sentenced myself to death,” portrayed the president as bashing China and threatening to ban TikTok to bolster his reelection chances after a disastrous federal response to the coronavirus pandemic. The video shows flattering images of presumptive Democratic nominee Joe Biden and predicted Trump will lose in November.

The researchers, from the network analysis firm Graphika, said it was the first direct reference to Biden from the Chinese network.

They also found persistent sloppiness in the videos overall, such as odd translations and a poor grasp of spoken English. An apparently automated voice, for example, said “us” for “U.S.” One video had words appear on-screen in English and Chinese saying the confusing phrase, “Cast A Chestnut In The Fire Will Burn Themselves With Fire.”

The videos and related content appeared on YouTube, Twitter and Facebook, all of which have closed fake accounts affiliated with the network. And though its posts regularly echoed official Chinese government propaganda, Graphika was unable to determine what relationship, if any, the network had with the Chinese government. Nor is it clear whether the intended audience was Chinese, American or a combination of both.

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