WHOA: Team of Israeli ex-spies boast of manipulating 33 elections w/ #hacking & #bots.
Tricked into demoing #telegram hacking & bot army to undercover investigators.
By @skirchy @manisha_bot @davidtpegg @carolecadwalla & @burke_jason
theguardian.com/world/2023/feb…
2/ “After you’ve created credibility, what do you do? Then you can manipulate"
Good to see @Meta take action on these accounts.
Honestly though we are at the absolute tip of the iceberg.
3/ Here he is demoing access to the #Gmail of a purported key political insider in #Kenya just days before the election.
This tech & tactics is kerosene on the flames of democracy.
4/ “I know in some countries they believe #Telegram is safe. I will show you how safe it is”
Yikes.
Unclear how he is gaining access to these #Gmail & Telegram accounts, but the talk of #SS7 is a good hint.
And yet another reminder: SMS is not a safe second factor.
5/ Great to see mercenary election manipulators exposed. Solid journalism.
Trust me, this is a window into a *much bigger industry* active in elections around the world.
So rare to see it caught.
6/ The fact that so much political activity happens on a handful of platforms makes the tooling for political manipulation really interoperable.
Also radically lowers barriers to entry.
Making mercenary election manipulation scaleable & easy to export.
7/ Of course, we don't know whether these guys have successfully changed the outcome of any election.
The guy here is also pretty clearly boasting & trying to sell.
But the mere fact of mercenary election manipulators running around is damaging, even when they don't win.
8/ Even if mercenary election manipulators don't successfully throw an election (e.g. successfully shift mass sentiment), bots, hacking & turbocharged dirty tricks can distort political culture.
Opposing parties have to adjust.
And the net result is harm to democracy.
9/ UPDATE: @haaretzcom reports the mercenary political manipulators targeted 🇺🇸US politicians.
Like @GavinNewsom in #California
Topic: #diablocanyon nuclear plant
Were taxpayer funds routed to #TeamJorge for that op?
STORY haaretz.com/israel-news/se…
10/ Powerful coda to this remarkable story
11/ Really remarkable undercover work went into this story.
Huge credit to @omerbenj @GurMegiddo & @FredMetzo for pulling off such a feat.
These are paranoid people confessing to illegal things, it cannot have been easy.
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