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Thread: Many months back I composed & saved a tweetstorm abt Russia's manipulation of social media & its far reaching effect on the election
Tho waiting to share, everyday seemed like we teetered on the brink of catastrophe & the topic took a back seat to healthcare, NK & Nazis 2/
Given the recent news about Russian FB ads & the enormous network of Russian Twitter trolls, I figure the time to share might be now 3/ 
Hopefully talking abt the relation b/w social media, Google & MSM ppl will begin to understand the clusterfck we faced & influence it had 4/
Without further ado I give you my slightly aged yet still relevant tweetstorm abt Russia & the systematic manipulation of our info stream 5/
While the media continue to ignore their role in shaping the '16 election, they line up to attack Hillary & her analysis of what happened 6/
So let's start by taking a look at how the media got played by Russian trolls early on & dragged us down this wretched rabbit hole 7/
I refer you to @maddow's clip abt trolls weaponizing our social media. The tip of the iceberg, yet important info 8/
Note, despite Maddow's report on this group & FBI confirmation of foreign disinformation, this propaganda mill STILL has 100k followers 9/
(Side rant: Given the reports, the federal investigation & the hot water FB is in, why the hell is this group still active on FB?!?) 11/
Before we go any further I wanna make a few things clear A) This thread isn't attacking Bernie B) Understanding these tactics is crucial 12/
I too tackled the topic citing the toxic influence of a popular 'Bernie lover' who was really alt-right & working for Russia's Sputnik 13/
And here's that thread for anyone interested. It shows a great example of the tactics used to manipulate us 14/
Yet many are dismissive saying 'Trolls & fake news on Twitter or FB, so what?' making it clear ppl don't understand how pervasive it was 15/
Which is why I'm here today talking abt Russian tactics, the media's idiocy, algorithms & Google. Yeah, I said Google. Fk'n Google 16/
Disinformation aka Dezinformatsiya is a known & time honored KGB active measure of psychological & information warfare. This is fact 17/
It started when trolls (members of Putins disinformation campaign) swamped Twitter & FB groups allowing them to push anti HRC messaging 18/
The trolls were so numerous & effective w/their anti-HRC messaging they were able to thwart any pushback by those who were catching on 19/
Even a Bernie staffer warned ppl abt trolls working to convince them not to vote for Hillary, but his voice was drowned out by the noise 20/
You read that right. Bernie's own digital outreach guru, who ran Bernie's Twitter account, noticed the disinformation. It was a problem 21/
Bots & trolls trending anti-HRC hashtags, circulating fake news & conspiracies were there to stay & next they took over online polls 22/
Remember how trolls rigged online polls for Trump? They did the same for Bernie leading voters to question Hillary's appeal & popularity 23/
How do we know? Most publications, pundits & traditional polling favored Hillary yet Bernie swept online polls by ridiculous margins 24/
Slate even wrote about the phenomenon slate.com/blogs/the_slat… 25/
And in true troll fashion, conspiracy theories then began circulating to discredit trusted media sources, accusing them of a cover up 🙄 26/
As planned, influence grew beyond social media to mainstream media, who noticed the online enthusiasm for Bernie & mistook it as organic 27/
Influencing MSM was the goal. Clinton Watts @selectedwisdom a standout of the Russian interference hearings discussed this strategy 28/
And that was when the tide had turned & Russia was successfully shaping the narrative of the election to undermine confidence in Hillary 29/
The next wall to fall was Google, whose search results are determined in a large part by social media activity & age of content 30/
Now when ppl searched topics or to verify or debunk claims they faced pages of propaganda while older reliable news was pushed aside 31/
The Internet was flooded with fake news specifically crafted to erode Hillarys support on the left & right & targeted to swing states 32/
And as mention, this new content, no doubt crafted by SEO experts & pushed out by a troll army gamed & effectively weaponized Google 33/
Google didn't help matters by removing the search by date option on mobile devices, which drive the majority traffic. Facts were buried 34/
(Personally I can't wait til the investigations take a long hard look at Google. They shape our reality yet are accountable to no one) 35/
And our MSM? From start to finish they were Click Hounds addicted to the shares & ad dollars their anti-Hillary content got them 36/
News outlets either didn't notice or didn't care their shares were coming from trolls & bots, they just wanted it circulated 37/
