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How did you get that from the article? Seems like the point was Facebook wasn't trying to get rid of Russian agents on it's site as much as it was trying to bol

How did you get that from the article? Seems like the point was Facebook wasn't trying to get rid of Russian agents on it's site as much as it was trying to bolster it's image. I think most of us have experienced the Russian "trolls" in one way or another, and there is very strong evidence that they have been, and continue to be, sponsored by the Russian state.

beaconstudios 8y ago
everyone has experienced trolls, but most of the time it's 4chan people trying to upset you for laughs.
- phyller 8y ago
  https://www.cnn.com/2018/10/19/politics/russian-troll-instructions/index.html https://www.cnn.com/2018/10/19/politics/russian-troll-instru... Also, below is a recent article about professional Iranian trolls, but mentions that the same cybersecurity company has been tracking Russian disinformation campaigns for years. There are thousands of people in Russia, in Iran, in other countries who go into the office every day and earn their paycheck by trying to move opinion in the USA and elsewhere in a certain direction, or spread FUD. https://www.nytimes.com/2018/08/23/technology/fireeye-facebook-disinformation.html https://www.nytimes.com/2018/08/23/technology/fireeye-facebo... > FireEye’s information operations analysis team was formed in 2016, when hacked emails from several political figures were beginning to appear on the site DCLeaks. “All through that period, we were tracking the Russian effort to influence U.S. elections,” Mr. Foster said. “Obviously, social media is a very important kind of medium by which these campaigns are undertaken.”
  - beaconstudios 8y ago
    yeah absolutely those people exist, I'm not denying it. But they're likely not the ones you've interacted with on twitter. Do you think Russia pays people to post inflammatory content on twitter, or to advocate for the Russian perspective like RT do? My money's on the latter.
    - dragonwriter 8y ago
      > Do you think Russia pays people to post inflammatory content on twitter, or to advocate for the Russian perspective like RT do? Yes. Oh, wait, did you imagine those were mutually exclusive?
      - beaconstudios 8y ago
        how on earth does it benefit Russia to pay people to perform the actions that 4chan people do? I can't imagine posting edgy memes and attempting to "trigger the libs" is a national marketing/propaganda/outreach strategy.
        BoiledCabbage 8y ago
        Because "trolls" is a horrible term for it. It's propaganda and sow discord. Inflame the far-left and far-right, get people to distrust traditionally more objective sources of information. Repeat lies on social media to reinforce desired narratives. Influence trending topics to direct discussion. All of this is fairly well known at this point. There are even cases of "troll" accounts being accounted and coming clean and sharing their twitter engagement numbers for particularly effective "fake news" tweets before deciding their exposed account. This isn't a few people in a basement it's a professionally run tech shop.
        beaconstudios 8y ago
        From what I've seen, the far-left have been inflamed since the late Obama years and the far-right have been inflamed by the actions and words of the far-left. All this goes back to Gamergate and further, and seems to just be spilling over more and more into the mainstream as the sides get more aggressive (though the severity does seem to have peaked in 2016/17 in my opinion). The Russian agents/bots I suspect I've seen are just adding fuel to the existing fire, though I question the effectiveness of their efforts. Overall the whole political division seems to predate the election and Russian involvement by quite a few years. It just seems to have been snowballing since. I mean, I remember seeing stuff about "feminazis" and "MRAs" like 10 years ago. I keep hearing that fake news and lies are being propagated but as a Brit I haven't really seen that outside the usual political propaganda around the referendum, and Trump's usual crass blathering that occasionally pops up in the news.

beaconstudios 8y ago

everyone has experienced trolls, but most of the time it's 4chan people trying to upset you for laughs.

phyller 8y ago
https://www.cnn.com/2018/10/19/politics/russian-troll-instructions/index.html https://www.cnn.com/2018/10/19/politics/russian-troll-instru... Also, below is a recent article about professional Iranian trolls, but mentions that the same cybersecurity company has been tracking Russian disinformation campaigns for years. There are thousands of people in Russia, in Iran, in other countries who go into the office every day and earn their paycheck by trying to move opinion in the USA and elsewhere in a certain direction, or spread FUD. https://www.nytimes.com/2018/08/23/technology/fireeye-facebook-disinformation.html https://www.nytimes.com/2018/08/23/technology/fireeye-facebo... > FireEye’s information operations analysis team was formed in 2016, when hacked emails from several political figures were beginning to appear on the site DCLeaks. “All through that period, we were tracking the Russian effort to influence U.S. elections,” Mr. Foster said. “Obviously, social media is a very important kind of medium by which these campaigns are undertaken.”
- beaconstudios 8y ago
  yeah absolutely those people exist, I'm not denying it. But they're likely not the ones you've interacted with on twitter. Do you think Russia pays people to post inflammatory content on twitter, or to advocate for the Russian perspective like RT do? My money's on the latter.
  - dragonwriter 8y ago
    > Do you think Russia pays people to post inflammatory content on twitter, or to advocate for the Russian perspective like RT do? Yes. Oh, wait, did you imagine those were mutually exclusive?
    - beaconstudios 8y ago
      how on earth does it benefit Russia to pay people to perform the actions that 4chan people do? I can't imagine posting edgy memes and attempting to "trigger the libs" is a national marketing/propaganda/outreach strategy.
      - BoiledCabbage 8y ago
        Because "trolls" is a horrible term for it. It's propaganda and sow discord. Inflame the far-left and far-right, get people to distrust traditionally more objective sources of information. Repeat lies on social media to reinforce desired narratives. Influence trending topics to direct discussion. All of this is fairly well known at this point. There are even cases of "troll" accounts being accounted and coming clean and sharing their twitter engagement numbers for particularly effective "fake news" tweets before deciding their exposed account. This isn't a few people in a basement it's a professionally run tech shop.
        beaconstudios 8y ago
        From what I've seen, the far-left have been inflamed since the late Obama years and the far-right have been inflamed by the actions and words of the far-left. All this goes back to Gamergate and further, and seems to just be spilling over more and more into the mainstream as the sides get more aggressive (though the severity does seem to have peaked in 2016/17 in my opinion). The Russian agents/bots I suspect I've seen are just adding fuel to the existing fire, though I question the effectiveness of their efforts. Overall the whole political division seems to predate the election and Russian involvement by quite a few years. It just seems to have been snowballing since. I mean, I remember seeing stuff about "feminazis" and "MRAs" like 10 years ago. I keep hearing that fake news and lies are being propagated but as a Brit I haven't really seen that outside the usual political propaganda around the referendum, and Trump's usual crass blathering that occasionally pops up in the news.