Meet @JaiRaison, @PoutineFrance, @TrumpFranceInfo, and @VotezPoisson, a quartet of French retweet bots with a fondness for various right-wing politicians. Each bot tweets via a custom app with a name ending in "Trusted News". #ThursdayThoughts
cc: @ZellaQuixote
cc: @ZellaQuixote
Who do these bots retweet? The most frequently retweeted accounts are @kleensamsonite (a French account that supports Trump, Putin, Israel, and Bolsonaro), @mfa_russia, and @realDonaldTrump, with a mix of French and English news and right-wing accounts rounding out the remainder.
What kind of news does one get from "Trusted News" botnet? It's a mix of Russian and French sources, with the White House and Iranian state media site PressTV thrown in for good measure. Some of the French sites include anti-immigrant content and #coronavirus disinformation.
The hashtags retweeted by the "Trusted News" botnet revolve around three themes: coronavirus, Trump, and Russia. Both French and English versions of several of the hashtags show up.
Finally, we found some subtle but noticeable anomalies lurking among the followers of the four accounts in this botnet. In particular, @JaiRaison, @TrumpFranceInfo, and @VotezPoisson's followers share a similar-looking artifact.
These artifacts correspond with 306 Japanese follower growth twittbot bots that followed the "Trusted News" botnet sometime in early 2018. With English and French tweets, Russian media, the White House, and Japanese spam in play, this botnet is truly an international marvel.
(previous thread that touches on the subject of Japanese followback spambots)
