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[hawkshockey11]

I'm totally in favor of having a few fake news sites running to permeate social media algorithms and eventually infect their computers with a nice little virus when the share counts start surging.

Have to start eroding trust in these social media links.

 

[Kayhan]

Russia's next project is to help California secede from the union.

 

[hobblygobbly]

Of course it's not a good idea.

But direct tampering is probably considered an act of war. How long are we just gonna give Russia a pass?

There is no evidence of direct tampering and unlikely there ever will be.

Propaganda first and foremost is not direct tampering, it's Russia using its influence to sway opinion and way of thinking. This is not unique to Russia, U.S does it, China does it.

Even cyber-related attacks are difficult to prove as direct tampering, since you need intelligence elsewhere to confirm it's mandated by the government. For example, a DDoS attack can occur right now that disrupts part of the U.S internet infrastructure, there would be no way to prove it was a mandate by the Russian government based on origin for example, since they're botnets and they are located all over the world, you could see a lot of Chinese IP addresses, doesn't mean it's China, you could see a Russian botnet, doesn't mean it's mandated by Russia.

Same goes with hacking, you need to prove that it's mandated by the government, just because they're Russian hackers doesn't mean it's coming from the government, hackers can even be mandated by foreign governments.

You need to gather intelligence and infiltrate through other means like spies in foreign intelligence agencies, otherwise it's difficult to find evidence with this sort of thing.

And to find intelligence suitable and not sensitive for the public is even more difficult.

A recent similar example: Breitbart trying to push into Europe, propaganda, sway opinion, is it necessarily mandated by the U.S government?

 

[Regulus Tera]

Of course it's not a good idea.

But direct tampering is probably considered an act of war. How long are we just gonna give Russia a pass?

I mean it's not like the US hasn't meddled in the elections of other countries and gotten away with it scott free.

 

[gaugebozo]

I mean it's not like the US hasn't meddled in the elections of other countries and gotten away with it scott free.

The US doing something wrong in the past isn't a license to do something wrong now.

 

[tuxfool]

A recent similar example: Breitbart trying to push into Europe, propaganda, sway opinion, is it necessarily mandated by the U.S government?

Ordinarily I would say "No". But given who is effectively chief of staff now, I would say it is mandated by the US gov't.

Likewise, Russia's media is state owned, so I'd say it is very much analogous to Breitbart.

 

[Regulus Tera]

The US doing something wrong in the past isn't a license to do something wrong now.

It isn't, but I don't think the US government has any moral ground to call Russia out, let alone start a war that would result in nuclear winter.

 

[Oersted]

Yes, the ability to be critical of sources, particularly online resources, is basically an essential skill, that need to be thought in schools. It's going to be a major issue going forward as more and more news and information is gathered through the internet and social media, and less through editorial staffs and printed/published media.

The next generation doesn't need to know and remember stuff as much as they need to process and sort out all the garbage information from the good information out there.

With Donald in power that is so not going to happen

 

[Hermii]

War is crazy talk as a response to a tactic that wouldn't work in the first place if people weren't uncritical enough to believe these fake news sites.

Also it is naive imo to think the US isn't using the exact same tactic in other countries.

 

[Oersted]

War is crazy talk as a response to a tactic that wouldn't work in the first place if people weren't uncritical enough to believe these fake news sites.

Also it is naive imo to think the US isn't using the exact same tactic in other countries.

Whataboutism is hillariously fitting, given the topic.

 

[Regulus Tera]

Whataboutism is hillariously fitting, given the topic.

Is it really whataboutism if one is pointing out the hipocrisy that permeates America's banner of free democratic elections? You can be critical of someone while not necessarily support the opposing party.

 

[wumster3000]

And people are/were of course dumb enough to believe this shit.

Truly uneducated people. I didn't want to believe that we had this many uneducated and scared people in America.

This Russia relationship with Trump is strange and very dangerous.

 

[Oersted]

Is it really whataboutism if one is pointing out the hipocrisy that permeates America's banner of free democratic elections? You can be critical of someone while not necessarily support the opposing party.

It is hipocrisy if someone bemoans Russia's influence on the American Election trough propaganda, while defending USA doing the same with other countries.


*looks around*

Noone did that.

Yes, it is whataboutism.

 

[Deku Tree]

We'll for sure Trump is not gonna investigate any election interference.

 

[Captain Smoker]

It isn't, but I don't think the US government has any moral ground to call Russia out, let alone start a war that would result in nuclear winter.

There is no "USA", there are people who have been in power making decisions in the past, which are not in power now.

Otherwise, Germany couldn't call out anyone ever again.*

*and many other countries.

 

[shira]

>trolls

Damn south park is like 10 steps ahead of the game

 

[CraigerGamer]

Well, after reading this I'm ready to start the GAF Propaganda Machine. Our first message to the world will be Russia fixed the voting machines in Michigan and Wisconsin. Hilary actually won both states handedly but the Russians fixed the vote. Who's with me?


GAFProp will also be spreading other untruths such as, Scorpio is really just an XBOX One with the secret second GPU turned on.

 

[wumster3000]

Russia's next project is to help California secede from the union.

I'm not going to lie, after this election, I've never been more proud to live here in California. Our state level governing bodies are fantastic! We have decided that we are not traveling to the Red States during his presidency - minus Georgia(ATL). We are going to travel up and down the West Coast to support states that protect people's rights.

 

[baxter2231]

Maybe if the "real" mainstream media wasnt so garbage, did their jobs and wasnt so focused on ratings the environment where this could happen wouldnt have exisited in the first place. Thy just followed Fox to try and get their ratings. Journalistic integrity lollll

 

[Sho_Nuff82]

Have we seen any evidence this was more likely to make people vote one way or another?

People who don't believe the media effects the populace are like people who don't think ads work on them. People get paid millions of dollars a year to sell you images and stories because they know it works.

 

[Hermii]

It is hipocrisy if someone bemoans Russia's influence on the American Election trough propaganda, while defending USA doing the same with other countries.


*looks around*

Noone did that.

Yes, it is whataboutism.

They were implying those other countries have a right to go to war against the US. Not that it wouldn't be suicide, but if something like this led to war there would be a lot of wars.

 

[AlphaDump]

The intent is to be a persistent threat and eventually fracture, and exploit any cracks as much as possible. Social engineering is a serious threat due to anonymity and the ability to be anyone from anywhere.

The internet was not ready for it.

 

[hydragonwarrior]

Basically, internal strife in the U.S. means less focus overseas. Especially if they end up going after a "small government" that doesn't care about interfering in foreign affairs. Russia is then free to do as it pleases without the US getting in it's way.

The moment Trump and Putin get a great relationship going, that'll be that.

 

[TedNindo]

I bet they are doing the same in Europe with the refugee crises and are in part responsible for the mindset that lead to the Brexit.

They are said to be funding right-wing parties. Pretty funny actually because they have been accused of doing the same on the left for years during the USSR.

 

[Man-is-Obsolete]

Either Russia totally fucked with this election six ways from sunday, or someone wants us to believe that they did.

Samantha Bee interviewed 2 of the trolls working at Kremlin financed troll houses. There are numerous stories about them. They were intentionally trying to tilt the election.

 

[Xando]

I fear the german election next year will be really ugly. Putin will do what he can to discredit Merkel and help the afd/left.

 

[BrutishMrFish]

It isn't, but I don't think the US government has any moral ground to call Russia out, let alone start a war that would result in nuclear winter.

You're right, but the US government calls other governments out on a regular basis regardless of how hypocritical their criticisms are, and they're not about to change that now.

 

[tiredheadcrab]

Kind of scary when you think about it. I see this girl on my Facebook constantly repost something from infowars or some shit. She isn't the brightest obviously. It's sad but the republicans will probably ride this wave of fake news. I wish there were better ways to counter this crap.

 

[Host Samurai]

This is so true. The trolling was abvous with all the fake social media profiles. I've been thinking this for months tbh.

 

[leroidys]

Remember reading a similar article about brexit a few months ago

 

[Crayon]

Now everyone pull your head out and think about how much propaganda you've been fed from the us government all your life.

 

[Wenger'sBakedBaguettes]

A bunch of unsourced "experts", a blacklist that includes leftist outlets given by Propornot who's made of anyonymous "researchers" and a executive director with granted anonoymity from WaPo. WaPo goes on to list the real American journalist traitors and even radio show hosts that are US-based and US-funded who existed well before Putin was even a relevant figure. This group is also promoted by people who want to investigate these terrible American traitors for violating the Espionage act.

Looking more at Propornot it seems to be only several months old and Google barely doesn't give much on it. It has listed ally sites which it didn't even contact first since some of their supposed allies said they don't even know who they are or who's behind the site. The site seems to links back to the blog of a Joel Harding who supposedly specialize in Russian disinformation warfare and is an anaylyst for what seems to be a funny looking Cold War think tank.

This screams even more propaganda than actual Russian propaganda but hey it's from the anonymous "experts", "researchers" and a secret exec. director then it must be pretty credible.

I can't help but laugh at this entire thing. Russian interference wouldn't be anything surprising at all, and now Americans get just a small taste of what they and other strong players constantly do around the world.

 

[Alx]

Of course, the FN connection is obvious but I was talking about the media. Le Pen is going to need a big push to overcome Fillon and I wonder if Russia is going to "help" in one way or another aside from just the financing.

(Un)fortunately Fillon is already a close friend of Poutine. Maybe Russia won't even need to do anything to get its way (or maybe they already did... the rise of Fillon to the status of favorite surprised everybody).

 

[hoola]

Interesting...I have a website and according to Google analytics the top spoken language used by visitors is "secret.google.com You are invited. Enter only with this ticket URL. Copy it. Vote for Trump.". And the top country of visitors is Russia... the very first thing I thought of was the Russian propaganda BS. The website has basically no real traffic so I found this kind of amusing, although I'm worried it got hacked.

 

[leroidys]

A bunch of unsourced "experts", a blacklist that includes leftist outlets given by Propornot who's made of anyonymous "researchers" and a executive director with granted anonoymity from WaPo. WaPo goes on to list the real American journalist traitors and even radio show hosts that are US-based and US-funded who existed well before Putin was even a relevant figure. This group is also promoted by people who want to investigate these terrible American traitors for violating the Espionage act.

Looking more at Propornot it seems to be only several months old and Google barely doesn't give much on it. It has listed ally sites which it didn't even contact first since some of their supposed allies said they don't even know who they are or who's behind the site. The site seems to links back to the blog of a Joel Harding who supposedly specialize in Russian disinformation warfare and is an anaylyst for what seems to be a funny looking Cold War think tank.

This screams even more propaganda than actual Russian propaganda but hey it's from the anonymous "experts", "researchers" and a secret exec. director then it must be pretty credible.

I can't help but laugh at this entire thing. Russian interference wouldn't be anything surprising at all, and now Americans get just a small taste of what they and other strong players constantly do around the world.

I don't really get what you're saying. Admitting that Russian government agencies used subversive tactics is lol-worthy and just US propaganda, then you admit that it obviously happened. (?)

 

[DragonSworne]

We honestly need to roll back the election and end Putin.

 

[Lokimaru]

Either Russia totally fucked with this election six ways from sunday, or someone wants us to believe that they did.

Sounds just like something a Ruskie would say ta keep us guessing. Wolverines!!!!

 

[Kaleinc]

The article forgot to mention half of the US is russians who all voted for Trump.

 

[JackDT]

It's amazing how effective the Russian were this election. Biggest victory for Russian espionage since stealing the atomic bomb.

Also the Washington Post has been doing amazing work.

 

[pgtl_10]

This article is sloppy and the source for the alleged "Russian propaganda" is a shady website which does not reveal its members or sources:

http://fortune.com/2016/11/25/russian-fake-news/

Furthermore the website substitutes its own opinion for Russian propaganda:

That means the characteristics of the propaganda outlets we identify are motivation-agnostic. For purposes of this definition it does not matter whether the sites listed here are being knowingly directed and paid by Russian intelligence officers, or whether they even knew they were echoing Russian propaganda at any particular point: If they meet these criteria, they are at the very least acting as bona-fide "useful idiots" of the Russian intelligence services, and are worthy of further scrutiny.

http://www.propornot.com/p/the-list.html?m=1

So this shady organization claims websites like Counterpunch and Antiwar that have been around for a long time are "Russian propaganda outlets" but have no proof.

Furthermore even Bellingcat who is run by that hack Elliot Higgins has disavowed the shady organization's claim that they are allies.

The shady organization's websites also contradicts itself:

7) Isn't this just McCarthyism?!

No. We are not accusing anyone of lawbreaking, treason, or "being a member of the Communist Party". We fiercely believe in the rights to freedom of expression and freedom of the press, and have no interest in seeing anyone punished for exercising them. Quite to the contrary.

However, when outlets and individuals echo, repeat, and refer their audience to Russian propaganda, we're going to highlight it. They have the right to do that, and we have the right to call them on it. We are also encouraging others to help us research this further, and we are calling for formal investigations by the US government, because we think the American people have the right to know when foreign governments are trying to mess with them.

Also, the kind of folks who make propaganda for brutal authoritarian oligarchies are often involved in a wide range of bad business. We strongly suspect that some of the individuals involved have violated the Espionage Act, the Foreign Agent Registration Act, and other related laws, but determining that is up to the FBI and the DOJ.

http://www.propornot.com/p/frequently-asked-questions.html?m=1

So the website says they are not accusing anyone of anything but proceed to accuse the websites of espionage? Also the website believes in free speech but calls for the FBI to investigate? The website is ameraturish.

To the poster above who claims that the Washington Post has done outstanding work, the information above shows the Washington Post has done a terrible job that was debunked within hours.