Tag Archives: disinformation

“Russia is relying on unwitting Americans to spread election disinformation, US officials say”

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AP:

The Kremlin is turning to unwitting Americans and commercial public relations firms in Russia to spread disinformation about the U.S. presidential race, top intelligence officials said Monday, detailing the latest efforts by America’s adversaries to shape public opinion ahead of the 2024 election.

The warning comes after a tumultuous few weeks in U.S. politics that have forced Russia, Iran and China to revise some of the details of their propaganda playbook. What hasn’t changed, intelligence officials said, is the determination of these nations to seed the internet with false and incendiary claims about American democracy to undermine faith in the election.

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“Sen. Rick Scott sounds a warning on foreign interference in elections”

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WUSF NPR:

Florida’s U.S. senator said the Biden administration isn’t doing enough to combat disinformation and interference from foreign actors in elections. . . .

Federal government investigators have found that foreign interference in elections has been rife since Russia tried to influence the outcome of the 2016 presidential election.

During an appearance in Tampa on Friday, U.S. Sen. Rick Scott said that interference has only gotten worse. Scott warned against the influence of foreign agents on American elections during an appearance with veteran’s groups. He took the Biden administration to task for what he said was not putting enough pressure on foreign governments to put the brakes on interference.

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“Elon Musk Shares Manipulated Harris Video, in Seeming Violation of X’s Policies”

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NYT:

Elon Musk, the world’s richest man, has waded into one of the thorniest issues facing U.S. politics: deepfake videos.

On Friday night, Mr. Musk, the billionaire owner of the social media platform X, reposted an edited campaign video for Vice President Kamala Harris that appears to have been digitally manipulated to change the spot’s voice-over in a deceptive manner.

The video mimics Ms. Harris’s voice, but instead of using her words from the original ad, it has the vice president saying that President Biden is senile, that she does not “know the first thing about running the country” and that, as a woman and a person of color, she is the “ultimate diversity hire.”

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“False rumors about Vance, Musk’s X show misinfo cuts both ways”

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Washington Post:

Billionaire Elon Musk pitches X as both a haven for free speech and a superior alternative to the mainstream media for keeping up with news and politics. Under his ownership, the social media platform formerly known as Twitter has pulled back on policing misinformation, relying instead on the wisdom of the crowd to debunk falsehoods.

Musk’s critics say that approach benefits the political right, with which Musk increasingly identifies. . .

This week a pair of falsehoods that originated and gained traction on X mostly among left-leaning users provided a reminder that online misinformation can come from anywhere in the political spectrum — and tested Musk’s commitment to letting users decide the truth for themselves.

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“FCC pursues new rules for AI in political ads, but changes may not take effect before the election”

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ABC News:

NEW YORK — The Federal Communications Commission has advanced a proposal that would require political advertisers to disclose their use of artificial intelligence in broadcast television and radio ads, though it is unclear whether new regulations may be in place before the November presidential election.

The proposed rules announced Thursday could add a layer of transparency in political campaigning that some tech watchdogs have called for to help inform voters about lifelike and misleading AI-generated media in ads….

But the FCC’s action is part of a federal turf war over the regulation of AI in politics. The move has faced pushback from the chairman of the Federal Election Commission, who previously accused the FCC of stepping on his own agency’s authority and has warned of a possible legal challenge.

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“A Volatile Election Is Intensifying Conspiracy Theories Online”

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NYT:

….The emergence of Vice President Kamala Harris as the new Democratic front-runner touched off new paroxysms of disinformation and explicitly hateful comments. More than one in 10 posts mentioning her on X on Sunday included racist or sexist attacks, according to PeakMetrics, which tracks activity online. They included false claims about her race and whether she was ineligible to run for the presidency because she was not a citizen. (She is a citizen, and she is eligible to run.)…

Most social media platforms profit when outrage and indignation results in more engagement, and ultimately, more advertising revenue. Companies have little incentive to alter the algorithms that allow toxic content to spread, despite calls from political leaders appealing to society’s better angels.

That dynamic appears all but certain to define this year’s presidential election, as it did in 2016 and 2020.

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“2024 elections are ripe targets for foes of democracy”

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NPR: 

This past summer and fall, thousands of Facebook accounts started posting about U.S. politics and foreign affairs. But their posts were weird — some included what looked like Twitter handles and the term “RT,” an abbreviation for “retweet.”When Facebook’s parent company, Meta, started digging into them, it found that the accounts were copying posts from Twitter, now known as X, and pasting them onto Facebook. The accounts were pretty obviously fake: While they claimed to belong to Americans, Meta found they were being operated from China, with stolen names and profile pictures.

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“As social media guardrails fade and AI deepfakes go mainstream, experts warn of impact on elections”

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PBS NewsHour:

Nearly three years after rioters stormed the U.S. Capitol, the false election conspiracy theories that drove the violent attack remain prevalent on social media and cable news: suitcases filled with ballots, late-night ballot dumps, dead people voting.

Experts warn it will likely be worse in the coming presidential election contest. The safeguards that attempted to counter the bogus claims the last time are eroding, while the tools and systems that create and spread them are only getting stronger.

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“How Russian and Chinese Interference Could Affect the 2024 Election”

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More analysis on this story from NYT: 

….As Washington looks ahead to the 2024 vote, U.S. intelligence agencies last week released a report on the 2022 midterm elections — a document that gives us some hints about what might be to come. . . . 

In 2022, the intelligence report found, Russia attempted to denigrate Democrats, including by amplifying allegations of corruption by Mr. Biden’s family, in large measure because of his administration’s support for Ukraine. . . With Republican opposition to Ukraine funding growing, officials believe that Moscow is likely to try to interfere even more in 2024. . . . 

It is not entirely clear what China is going to do, or what side it will take in 2024. But the report suggests that Chinese leaders viewed the 2022 election as a chance to portray the U.S. model as chaotic.  . . .

China has already begun experimenting with artificial intelligence in its influence campaigns. Industry experts say that new technologies will make it easier for foreign countries to mimic native English speakers and generate messages amplifying existing divisions more rapidly.

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Lawyers’ Committee files amicus in Murthy v. Missouri

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From the Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights Under Law:

Washington, DC – Today, the Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights Under Law filed an amicus brief in Murthy v. Missouri in support of social media platforms’ ability to censor harmful disinformation. The brief follows the Lawyers’ Committee’s similar filing last week in Netchoice, LLC v. Paxton and Moody v. NetChoice, LLC, the Supreme Court cases concerning Texas House Bill 20 and Florida Senate Bill 7072, laws that would vitiate the ability of online businesses to remove content spewing hate and disinformation on their platforms.

In the brief, the Lawyers’ Committee argues that social media companies have an obligation to safeguard elections from disinformation, misinformation and other threats, underscoring the importance of collaboration between these entities to develop and enforce policies that protect the integrity of the electoral process.

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