Thread 1/ This is a thread on pro-Russian propaganda & #disinformation. I analysed the hashtags "i stand with Putin" & "i stand with Russia'. I analysed around 20,000 Twitter interactions involving 9600 unique accounts
2/ The network graph shows Twitter accounts interacting. The nodes represent individual accounts, the lines between them tweets, RTs replies etc. Different colours are different communities (accounts that tend to interact with one another more) #UkraineRussiaWar#Ukraine
3/ Below. You can see three distinct clusters.
Cluster 1 (left) accounts that seem to support the hashtag (pro Putin and Russia)
Cluster 2 (middle) = accounts criticising the hashtag
Cluster 3 (bottom) = accounts and bots spamming hashtag and thus boosting it #UkraineRussianWar
4/ The bot type cluster (cluster 3) seem to be accounts offering products, laptops etc, jumping on the hashtag to promote their wares. Most of them seem to be connected to Kenya, including this Kenyan opposition account. Of course, their tweets boost the trend #UkraineRussianWar
5/ Cluster 2, the anti Putin accounts, are very active, and very large. These are people, like @NickKnudsenUS and @PalmerReport who are condemning the hashtag. This is well meaning of course, but boosts the hashtag, which many would consider a bad thing #UkraineRussianWar
6/ Then we have cluster 1, the people seemingly supporting putin, russia and war. Some of the most retweeted accounts on this hashtag include @sachin012yadav , a pro-Modi account - only 56 followers and around 260 tweets, despite an old account from 2015 . Profile pic seems
7/ to lead to some website offering tutors. Another popular tweet is the account based out of Pakistan posting a video of Trump defending Putin through whataboutism. It's ok though, this guy's a Capricorn... 🙄
8/ One of the most popular retweets below is from an account that appears to use a stock image as a profile picture. It also is a 7year old account with less than 200 tweets, but somehow the tweet has thousands of tweets + likes. #UkraineRussiaWar
9/ Most of the account that report their own location data (obviously can't be construed as accurate - but is interesting), say they are based in Kenya, South Africa, Nigeria, India and the US. This locational information is interesting as most of the tweets use same tropes
10/ Many of the tropes focus on whataboutism and have been inspired by Western media racism. There is emphasis on Western hypocrisy and double standards, and racism. Not sure why that makes it ok for Russia to invade Ukraine and to stand with Putin... #UkraineRussianWar
11/ There are a few common engagement techniques, presumably designed to drive traffic on the hashtag. A lot of these tweets asking you to RT or like depending on whether you support Russia or Ukraine appear to be very popular #UkraineRussianWar #disinformation
12/ There are lots of other red flags too, such as a disproportionately large number of accounts created in the past few weeks. Some of these accounts, while barely a day old, have crazy high engagement rates too. Check out MANIKAN00673636 for example. #UkraineRussiaWar
13/ A note re whataboutism. Many of the tropes create the straw man that 'No one condemns West when they do this, so why condemn Russia'. While there is an underlying truth, it is also extreme hyperbole, designed to deflect attention from Russia's current invasion to the West's
14/ past behaviour. While future media analyses will be telling, at the moment it just serves to remove sympathy from Ukrainians by painting them as part of a racist and hypocritical Western establishment. I doubt dead civilians the world over will enjoy being used this way
15/ anyway, that's it for now. To sum up. There are bots, spam and what appears to be lots of inauthentic behaviour driving the 'i stand with putin' and 'i stand with russia' hashtag. Of course there are real people in there too, not least those condemning the hashtag. #Ukraine
16/ One of the dominant themes of the hashtag appears to be polarization/adversarial: exploiting incidences of racism and western bias to try and undermine sympathy for Ukrainians, and thus paint Putin as somehow standing up to the West #UkraineRussiaWar#disinformation
17/ For those asking - I used @nodexl to import tweets, Gephi for the network graph, and tableau for the timelines
19/ Just to be clear. The main clusters don't look like bots.The Kenyan cluster and cluster I mention in the update do look automated. Many of the rest look suspicious, like troll or astroturfing accounts, though I'm aware people use the term bots as shorthand for 'dodgy account'
20/ Another update. This thread is a detailed dive into just one of the accounts spreading the propaganda. Enjoy!
🧵1/ Thread on the Islamophobic and antisemitic disinformation about the #SydneyAttack . I downloaded X posts that wrongly stated that the attacker, Joel Cauchi, was either a Muslim or Jewish terrorist
2/ The size of the network was at least 140,000 posts (from X). This time series graph shows that initially, most of the disinformation (red bars) accused the attacker of being a Muslim or Islamist. At about 1700 UTC we see more and more disinfo about the attacker
3/ being Jewish (orange bars). This temporal analysis reflects the fact that there is a notable tendency when it comes to such attacks in Western countries to accuse, without evidence, the perpetrator of being Muslim. To accuse the attacker of being Jewish is less common
🧵1/ Just want to point out a few disturbing elements regarding misinformation in this article - "What's I've Heard From Gaza" published in the @TheAtlantic . I will focus on two specific references that are quite crucial in framing a broader argument about Hamas's actions #Gaza
2/ The article asserts with no equivocation that Hamas killed fleeing civilians on the Al Rashid coastal road in Nov 23. Not only is there no evidence for this, but the link is to an article in the Jerusalem Post, that relies on a tweet from known disinfluencer, @amjadt25
3/ Even if one wasn't to take an Occam's razor approach (i.e. it was probably the IDF since they have killed > 33000 people), then it would make sense to at least report this ambiguously. Reuters, for example, covered the strike, but did not even mention it could have been Hamas
🧵It is increasingly clear that ISGAP are operating in a capacity that has nothing to do with antisemitism, but rather malicious disinformation and a war on education. Their latest report is akin to saying ppl in Qatar shouldn't study *anything*, anywhere, lest they nuke us all
2) The highlight is perhaps how they use the third party aggregate edurank to "prove" that @tamuq and @QatarUniversity have "nuclear engineering programs". I don't even think a first year uni student would be this stupid. Neither uni has a nuclear engineering program, but I love
3) the idea that somehow the cunning foxes at Edurank managed to be party to this information that has been hidden from the public. The "report" then documents research projects at TAMUQ that could be "dual use". Below are some favourites. I kid you not, studying "sensors" is
🧵Although there is more pressure on right-wing and pro-Israel lobbies, most of the reporting on Texas A&M's recent decision to close its Qatar campus in four years cites a report by ISGAP - a pro -Israel think tank, which launched a disinformation campaign about nuclear secrets
It goes back to this press release on 4th Jan 2024, when ISGAP claimed absurdly that Qatar could exert control over nuclear weapons research. Make no mistake, it's a disinformation campaign. It is also evident that the only people who took it 'seriously' were right wing
think tank, or Israeli media - e.g. @i24NEWS_EN @Jerusalem_Post . The fact some of these articles were written by FDD-affiliated 'journalists' (& by that I mean people with a record of harassing people who aren't pro-Israel) simply highlights the fact they are not credible
🧵🚨Discovered hundreds of sock puppets promoting Israeli propaganda on X, Threads, FB & Insta. It also includes 'fake' websites. Recently, it has been spreading anti-UNRWA #disinformation, & trying to undermine solidarity between Palestinians & Black people. #Gaza
Analysis 👉
2/ A few people noticed that influential accounts writing about Gaza were getting replies with people linking a @WSJ article about an Israeli 'intelligence' report claiming 10% of UNRWA staff have links to Hamas. One of the authors of the WSJ was a former IDF soldier.
3/ You may have noticed that the wording of the tweets was very similar. All of them focused on the '10%' figure. All of them uncritically embraced the 10% figure of UNRWA employees being 'linked' to Hamas.
🧵1/ Analysis of why Israel's UNRWA 'dossier' smearing UNRWA is misleading propaganda.
Indeed, Israel's own statistics actually show that the alleged Hamas presence in UNRWA is significantly LOWER than elsewhere in #Gaza.
Read on for more >
2/ A number of outlets, including Reuters, Sky News, CNN and Forbes (to name but a few) have run stories about an intelligence dossier provided by Israel (solid source!) attempting to smear UNRWA. @EylonALevy even called UNRWA a 'front' for Hamas'
3/ First the claims.
Claim one: 190 UNRWA employees in Gaza are 'hardened militants'. The WSJ reported that the dossier noted that 23% of UNRWA male employees had ties to Hamas (whatever that means), a higher percentage than 15% for adult males in Gaza.