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ISIS Religious and Extremist Propaganda on Social Media: Dictionary-Based Study of Twitter

Ahmet Yiitalp TULGA

Abstract

The world had faced with many terrorist organizations until 2014. However, after 2014, the world faced with the most complicated terrorist organization. This terrorist organization is ISIS or Islamic State of Iraq and Syria. ISIS has been running a more different propaganda campaign, emphasizing the state-building and welfare schemes run by this organization and these elements make ISIS more complicated. ISIS has been very well integrated into the new technology such as social media and smartphone and ISIS has been using them very effectively. EspeciallyTwitterhas become a major component of ISIS social media movement. Twitterwas used to spread sensationalistic ISIS photos and videos across the Twitter users. While ISIS spread fear and messages on twitter, at the same time it also gained supporters. However, it is seen that ISIS sympathizer uses different jargons in terms of their number of followers in twitter. As a result of my research, I found that users with more followers used a stronger violence jargon on Twitter, while users with fewer followers using a softer and more religious language. Users with less followers were an emphasis on unity and religion, while users with more followers encouraging physical violence such as lone wolf attacks and killing enemy appeared more often on Twitter. Dictionary-based analysis of ISIS' and its sympathizers' tweets were performed. This dictionary-based research creates a typology to explain and categorize tweets from ISIS and its followers. For reliability, "Split-half test" was applied to the results and similar results were reached.

Keywords: ISIS, Twitter, Dictionary-Based Analysis, Propaganda

INTRODUCTION

Terrorism is one of the biggest challenges in our world. After 9/11 terrorist attack in USA, a war against terrorism was launched by many governments around the world. This war against terrorism still continues today, and this war has become more severe and deep (i.e. Syria, Philippines, Iraq and Somalia).

It is very useful to start with the definition of terrorism first. In this study, the definitions of terrorism of Walter and Sandler, CIA (Central Intelligence Agency ) and NATO (North Atlantic Treaty Organization) were used. According to Central Intelligence Agency,[1] terrorism means premeditated, politically motivated violence perpetrated against noncombatant targets by subnational groups or clandestine agents, usually intended to influence an audience. Furthermore, NATO states that terrorism means the illegal use or attempted use of physical force, the instilling of fear and terror, against persons or properties in an attempt to coerce or manipulate regimes or communities, or to obtain control over the population, to achieve political, religious or ideological goals.[2] Finally, Walter and Sandler describe global and domestic terrorism as planneduse or threat of use of extra-normal violence or aggression to accomplish a political goal by coercion or apprehension of a targeted audience.[3] However, despite all these definitions, terrorism is a complicated phenomenon; therefore, it cannot be explained by just one case or event. Terrorism needs to be explained more fully and in-depth. [4]

Some scholars stated that modern terrorism beganwith the French Revolution in 1789.[5] Some other scholars such as Kaplan and Rapoport think that modern terrorism started in Russia in the end of 1880.[6] Rapoport considers that terrorism consists of 4 main waves.[7] Anarchist wave, anti-colonial wave, new left wave and religious wave are the 4 waves of modern terrorism.[8] I think that current terrorism is different than four waves of terrorism. This current terrorism could be considered as a fifth wave of terrorism. Martin thinks that terrorism has been a dark character of personal behavior since the dawn of recorded history.[9] Current terrorism varies from past acts of terrorism. Terrorism is a mobile, global threat in the modern era. Terrorist organizations or terrorists could easily create and increase fear through sophisticated communication Technologies such as social media. Terrorist organizations are now better positioned to profit from current technological developments than any other suspect. The propensity to use software makes it difficult for terrorist organizations to beat modern counter- terrorism tactics.[10] Nevertheless, contemporary terrorist organizations vary because they do not see their organizations as strong enough to fight a real war with their own or other countries. However, the global terror and terrorist organizations that we face today are quite different from previous terrorist organizations. Alternatively, they prefer violence as the best way to fight for themselves. Although some governments have been suffering from terrorism for a long time, the 9/11has shown that terrorism is the biggest problem in the world. This problem has grown in scope and severity over time. [11]

The world had faced with many terrorist organizations until 2014. However, after 2014, the world faced with the most complicated terrorist organizations such as ISIS (Islamic State of Iraq and Syria). ISIS has been running a more positive propaganda campaign, emphasizing the state-building and welfare schemes run by these organizations and these elements make ISIS more complicated. In parallel with these thoughts, Atran argues that military struggle with ISIS and other terrorist organizations is not enough. Western governments need to fight against ISIS and other extremist organizations also in psychological area. Western countries generally underestimate ISIS and this is western countries one of the biggest problem in the fighting against ISIS and other extremist organizations.[12]

On June 29, 2014, ISIS officially declared the establishment of an Islamic Caliphate in Syria and Iraq. This terrorist organization has had a pervasive presence in both social media and the mainstream media. This type of terror was different than the previous examples. ISIS has been very well integrated into the new technology such as social media and smart phone and it has been using them very effectively. The most important of these new technologies used by ISIS is social media. In particular, in recent years, the development of social media and mass media has also affected terrorism. Increasing the importance of social media in recent years has benefited the terrorist organizations. Today, terrorist organizations make their propaganda through social media and mass media. There is a relationship between mass media and terrorist organizations, based on mutual benefit. [13]

This study examines the connection between social media and terrorist organizations, especially ISIS. This paper is tried to explain how ISIS uses social media, specifically twitter. In this context, the tweets of ISIS sympathizers between 2016-2017 were examined and then the sympathizers were divided into two groups based on their number of followers. Subsequently, it was investigated whether the two groups shared mainly terrorist/violent content or religious-based posts. Lastly, 20 users who posted the most tweets were found, and these users were divided into two again based on their number of followers. As in the previous stage, it was analyzed whether both groups shared terror or religious content. All analyzes in this study were made with R programming language and tweets were analyzed with dictionary-based research method.

LITERATURE REVIEW

Digital world provides freedom to exchange communication and thought flows, as there are certain organizations who misuse the power of the internet, social media and online forums to promote false views and harmful impact on others.[14] In line with this thought, Chalothorn and Ellman also think that the internet has become an important instrument for communication, training, fundraising, media operations, and recruiting for radical and extremist organizations, especially since the early 2000s.[15]

In the early literature, the use of web forums by terrorist organizations is frequently emphasized. Early literature emphasizes that web forums have been major areas on the internet for social networking and debate. They are also used for correspondence by some extremist organizations and for disseminating their philosophies to the public.[16] Often, since it can be reached anywhere and provides access to a wide variety of ideological content that can be converted into different languages, the internet and web forums have become the key instrument used by terrorists.[17]

Likewise, Rebollo et al. [18] think that extremist groups and terrorist organizationsuse social networks and the internet to spread messages with the aim of manipulating individuals and attracting new participants. Social networks play a very significant part in people's way of thought. Repeated messaging may reinforce political ideas or even flip the way of thinking of the most indecisive when correctly aimed.[19]

There has been a dramatic increase in the use of social media in the 2010s. With the increasing popularity of social media, it has become possible to see many posts about terrorism and hate crimes on social media. In parallel with this, in recent years, the relationship between social media and terrorist organizations, especially in the context of ISIS, has been studied extensively.

Some of the most important examples of the relationship between social media terrorism is Al-Shabaab broadcasted live on twitter its armed attack to a shopping mall. [20] Similarly, ISIS broadcasted live on internet the killing of Turkish and Jordanian soldiers.[21] Terrorist organizations aim to expand their wars with these strategies. At the same time, social media is used to create fear in the public. Likewise, some scholar such as Sharif, Mumtaz, Shafiq, Riaz and Choi think that in order to promote negative ideologies by sharing radical content among audiences, many people use social media sites. Waqas Sharif, Shahzad Mumtaz, Zubair Shafiq, Omer Riaz, Tenvir Ali, Gyu Sang Choi and Mujtaba Husnain argue that many terrorist organizations such as ISIS effectively use social media today. They support that aggressive and offensive tweets, posts, comments, and hateful statements based on agendas are circulated by these extremist groups.[22] More than 100,000 tweets were posted during the ISIS invasion of Iraq and photographs were posted on internet from the captured cities.[23] Tweets created a fear over many city residents in Iraq and Syria and people began to flee from their cities.[24] Similarly, Weinburg and Eubank think that modern forms of communication, social media, promote the spread of terrorism from one place to another.[25]

On the other hand, terrorist organizations gain many supporters through their propaganda in social media. Sharif, Mumtaz, Shafiq, Riaz and Choi support that by reaching a worldwide audience, social media has now become the best way for these radical groups and terrorist organizations to attract new people into their organizations, and then these groups eventually begin to influence newly recruited people to promote aggression and extremism.[26] For this reason, terrorist organizations like ISIS organize their propaganda on social media in many different languages.[27] People who decide to join organizations communicate with members of the organization through social media such as Facebook.[28]

Almost 5000 European young people joined ISIS.[29] This number is really high compare to 1980 Afghanistan-USSR war mujahedin population and 2003 USA Iraq invasion. This is because new ISIS terrorism offers freedom to Muslim European in the world and afterlife. Also, social change and media in Europe play an important role in member acquisition. Most of the young people are afraid of being unemployment, homeless and etc But ISIS offers to be hero and martyr, also in ISIS people doesnt need to be afraid about job and home. Other important thing in the rising of ISIS is identity crisis in Europe.[30] For a long time, most of the European people were not seen Muslim European people as their country citizen. For this reason, ISIS offers a good alternative to these young people. ISIS offers them to be citizen of the caliphate and these young people come to Syria to support ISIS and this caliphate. Such propaganda of ISIS reaches millions of young people through social media. The author thinks that social media plays an important role in the recruitment process. [31]

Similarly, a researchreleased by the USA Center for Cyber and Homeland Security on terrorism explains that social media is a central instrument for encouraging radicalization, and the research further shows that this is a commonly adopted method of attracting new recruits of terrorist organizations around the world, concentrating of particular on users from Europe and the United States.[32] The pervasive use of social media has affected the lives of individuals in societies. Extremist groups today also use social media to distribute their opinions to a wider audience, either to create support for their cause or to attract individuals. [33, 34]

In parallel with these studies, Ferrara thinks that terrorist acts carried out on behalf of ISIS between 2014 and 2018 by lone wolf terrorists or sleeper cells on American and European soil inform everyone of the value of recognizing the mechanisms of radicalization mediated by networks of social media contact.[35] Many countries and non-governmental organizations have been involved in the dissemination of their propaganda on social media. In some cases, these networks have reportedly been polluted with content to manipulate public opinion, [36, 37] or to obstruct the capacity of social movements to connect, organize and mobilize.[38] Onthe other hand, through hatred and inflammatory tweets, postsor speeches, and even slick videos that contribute to the spread of violence and radicalization, the growth of social media has led to a growing online cyber-war.[39]

Social media platforms such as twitter and YouTube have become the platforms actively used by many terrorist organizations, especially ISIS. Some scholars in the literature focus on YouTube strategies of ISIS and other organizations. One of these studies was written by Derek O'Callaghan, Nico Prucha, Derek Greene, Maura Conway, Joe Carthy, and P'adraig Cunningham. According to them,[40] a number of suspected sources utilize YouTube to record and showcase actions as they unfold, where, according to official estimates, over a million videos have been posted since January 2012, which in turn have earned hundreds of millions of views. These data only cover the period from the Syrian civil war involving terrorism to 2014.[41]

The bulk of these are militant jihadists, with a specific preference for the doctrine of ISIS reflected in their orientation. Founded in the summer of 2013, the top rated YouTube channel has over 6,500 subscribers and 1.7 million cumulative views of 1,000 + episodes, most of which show the everyday situation on the ground in the mainly Sunni sectors under attack in Aleppo. [42]

Similarly, Kohlmann and Alkhouri suggest that as a recruiting instrument, ISIS also produces high quality videos in many languages. As an example, ISIS produced an English video entitled "There is No Life Without Jihad" featuring Foreign fighters who have to join others.[43]Most of ISIS' propaganda focuses on reports on military victories and the progress of ISIS in enforcing various facets of Islamic law or order. Likewise, in most cases, people entering ISIS received information from the internet that came from notable people in the form of tweets, personal communication via social media, and videos and teachings digitally.[44]

Some scholars in the literature have focused on ISIS' usage of Twitter. A research reported in reveals that more than 125,000 Twitter accounts were identified in 2015 through human judgments linked to terrorist and extremist actions. [45] While there is sparse specific literature on the use of social media by ISIS, there are clear signs that the party tends to be reasonably media savvy with a strong presence on multiple social media sites. [46] ISIS, for instance, maintains several Twitter accounts that spread the message of the community in many languages. New ones are quickly created to replace them when accounts are taken down.[47]

Similar research by Berger and Morgan [48] indicated that much of the popularity of ISIS on Twitter is responsible for a small number of highly-effective accounts (500-1000 users). Berger's following study, however, indicated that the reach of ISIS has been stalled for months since the startof 2016, owing to Twitter's increasingly stringent account suspension policies.[49] Most accounts have a small number of followers, but a substantial number of ISISsupporters have managed to get a large number of followers before being removed. On Twitter, a large proportion of ISIS supporters' accounts have been very involved in activity.[50] Berger and Morgan havealso seen a substantial uptake in the number of adoptions in the three months between March and June 2015, peaking at nearly 1,000 adoptions per day.[51] At least 10,000 tweets a day (70,000-100,000 tweets / week) were produced from ISIS supporter's accounts during that time.[52]

It is generally claimed that by streaming its savage attacks over social media outlets such as Twitter, which helps radicalize and eventually attract fighters from across the world, ISIScontrolto expand its membership to tens of thousands of people.[53]

Walid Magdy, Kareem Darwish, and Ingmar Weber propose an analysis using data from Twitter to help grasp the origins of this organization and its backers. Walid Magdy, Kareem Darwish, and Ingmar Weber begin by compiling and classifying vast quantities of ISIS-related Arabic tweets into pro-ISIS and anti-ISIS.[54]

RESEARCH DESIGN

In this study, an analysis based on dictionary-based method is used and the tweets of ISIS sympathizers between 2016 and 2017 were analyzed within the scope of the content. Within the scope of the Twitter analysis, 20000 tweets sent by ISIS sympathizers between 2016 and 2017 were examined. The tweets sent by the sympathizers were analyzed by dictionary-based analysis method.

I use dictionary-based research to automatically identify terrorism/violent and religious rhetoric in the tweets despite the complexity of manually coding over 20000 long texts. As a classical content analysis is a very time-consuming and potentially costly endeavor, I have also established a much simpler accessible terrorism and religious metric focused on computer-driven content analysis.

This metric is based on the dictionary method where a program calculates the proportion of terms that Ifind to be terrorism/violent or religious markers. This indicates that terms are the standard of measurement, instead of paragraphs.[55] The choice of terms for the dictionary from this analysis was based on both analytical and theoretical logic.[56] For motivation, I used analytical samples to draw up a collection of terms used by some newspapers to describe their skepticism or positivity against ties between the terrorism/violent and religious.

This method scans the records for a specified set of words to occur and gives each record a prevalence score for each word.[57] This helps one to analyze terrorism and religious counts and proportions by interest factors, including years, and months.[58] I create the dictionary of terror and religious words, then reading a random subset of tweets and defining possibly applicable words, then running the study centered on those terms, and eventually discovering additional terms in documents defined by the algorithm as terrorism content or religious content.

In the Twitter analysis, firstly, 20000 tweets were divided into users with high followers and fewer followers, and it was analyzed whether the tweets sent by both groups were related with religious or terrorism. In this analysis, those with less than 4000 followers are included in the category of those with fewer followers, and those with more than 4000 followers are included in the category with many followers. Later, those who tweeted the most on the subject were found, and the ones who tweeted the most were divided into two categories according to the number of followers, and it was examined whether each category tweeted based on religion or terrorism.

RESULTS

20000 tweets sent by ISIS sympathizers between 2016-2017 were analyzed. In this analysis, firstly all of the tweets sent were examined. Looking at the general results, it is revealed that most of the tweets contain terrorism and violence.

Figure 1- General Tweet Analysis results

In the next stage, all of the tweets are divided into two groups based on their number of followers. First, the tweets of users with more than 4000 followers were examined. It has been found that users with a high number of followers predominantly posted terror and violent content tweets.

Figure 2- Results of users with more than 4000

Later, the tweets posted by users with less than 4000 followers were analyzed and it was observed that, unlike those with a high number of followers, more religious tweets were posted. However, it has been observed that the rates of religious tweets and terror content tweets are very close to each other.

Figure 3- Users with Less than 4000 Followers Results

In the second step, the tweets of 20 users who posted the most tweets were examined.

Figure 4- 10 Users who Posted the Most Tweets

As a result of this analysis, it was found that the 20 users who tweeted the most often posted terror content tweets.

Figure 5- Results of 20 Users who Tweeted the Most Often

Users who most tweeted are divided into two groups based on their number of followers among themselves. Unlike the general tweet analysis, both groups predominantly posted terrorism content. However, it was found that users with fewer followers had more religious tweets than those with more users.

Most tweeted users with fewer followers

Most tweeted users with many followers

Figure 6 - Results of 20 Users who Tweeted the Most Often

CONCLUSION

Terrorism is one of the biggest problems facing the world in recent years. Terrorism has become more complicated, especially with the advancement of technology and the spread of social media. Because social media offers the opportunity to transfer the propaganda and messages of terrorist organizations to millions of people in a very short time.

ISIS has observed these opportunities offered by social media well and used advancing technologies and social media very effectively. One of the social media platforms that ISIS uses most effectively is Twitter. In this context, how and for what purpose ISIS sympathizers use Twitter was examined in this study. The study includes 20000 tweets of ISIS sympathizers between 2016 and 2017.

Many important findings have been reached in this study. The first finding emerged from the general analysis of tweets. The overall analysis of the tweets was found to be involved terror and violence content as expected. However, the most important findings are the results obtained as a result of dividing ISIS sympathizers into groups based on their number of followers.

As a result of this grouping, it was found that users with more followers tweeted terrorist and violent content. However, it was found that users with few followers mainly tweet religious content. These two findings are in parallel with ISIS's use of twitter. The reason why ISIS uses social media and Twitter is to spread fear all over the world, to recruit new member and to justify their actions and attacks. From this point of view, the strategy of spreading fear to the whole world is managed by users with many followers. Because thousands of people see the tweets of these users in a very short time and the effect of these tweets are more. Especially with Twitter's features such as retweet, this number reaches millions in a very short time.

On the other hand, users with fewer followers are generally followed by people with whom they share similar views. For this reason, these users are not on a mission to spread fear and therefore do not need to tweet related with terror and violent content. However, the function of these users with few followers is to interpret ISIS' actions on a religious level among people who share similar views and thus legitimize the actions. In this way, it is aimed to continue the support of the sympathizers to ISIS and to justify the activities of the organization by interpreting them on a religious level. These results are also supported by the analysis findings of the tweets of the users who tweet the most.

This study is quite different from the literature in terms of the results achieved. There are some researches on the use of Twitter by ISIS in the early literature, but there is no user-based study. In addition, the dictionary-based method approach used in the study is not a frequently used method in the literature and this research differs in terms of research method.

The study has some limitations. One of the primary limitations of the study is that the tweets only cover the years 2016 and 2017. Future studies that cover a wider time period can reach more generalizable results.

Notes

[1] Harris, Grant T. (2005). "The CIA mandate and the war on terror." Yale L. & Pol'y Rev. 23:529.

[2] Bebler, Anton. (2005). "NATO and transnational terrorism." PERCEPTIONS: Journal of International Affairs 9 (4):159-175.

[3] Enders, Walter, and Todd Sandler. (2000). "Is transnational terrorism becoming more threatening? A time-series investigation." Journal of Conflict Resolution 44 (3):307-332.

[4] McCormick, Elizabeth M. (2003). Enemy Aliens: Double Standards and Constitutional Freedoms in the War on Terrorism. HeinOnline.

[5] Gzel, Cemal (2002). Korkunun Korkusu: Terrizm, Silinen Yzler Karsnda Terr, Haz. Cemal Gzel, Ankara: Ayra.

[6] Rapoport, David C. (2001). "The fourth wave: September 11 in the history of terrorism." Current History 100 (650):419-424; Kaplan, J. (2016). "Terrorist Groups and the New Tribalism: Terrorism's Fifth Wave." Terrorism and Political Violence 28: 185-187.

[7] Rapoport, David C. (2001), p. 422.

[8] Ibid

[9] Martin, Susan, and Philip Martin. (2003). "International migration and terrorism: Prevention, prosecution and protection." Geo. Immigr. LJ 18:329.

[10] Teymur, Samih (2007). A Conceptual Map for Understanding the Terrorist Recruitment Process: Observation and Analysis of DHKP/C, PKK, and Turkish Hezbollah Terrorist Organizations: University of North Texas.

[11] Ibid

[12] Atran, Scott. (2020). "Psychology of transnational terrorism and extreme political conflict." Annual review of psychology 72.

[13] Wilkinson, Paul. (1997). "The media and terrorism: A reassessment." Terrorism and political violence 9 (2):51-64.

[14] Seib, Philip, and Dana M Janbek. (2010). Global terrorism and new media: The post-Al Qaeda generation: Routledge.

[15] Chalothorn, Tawunrat, and Jeremy Ellman. (2012). "Using SentiWordNet and sentiment analysis for detecting radical content on web forums."

[16] Ibid

[17] Ibid

[18] Snchez-Rebollo, Cristina, Cristina Puente, Rafael Palacios, Claudia Piriz, Juan P Fuentes, and Javier Jarauta. (2019). "Detection of jihadism in social networks using big data techniques supported by graphs and fuzzy clustering." Complexity 2019.

[19] Ibid

[20] Akbar, Zara. (2017). "Why join ISIS? The causes of terrorism from the Muslim youth perspective." University of Huddersfield.

[21] Farwell, James P. (2014). "The media strategy of ISIS." Survival 56 (6):49-55.

[22] Sharif, Waqas, Shahzad Mumtaz, Zubair Shafiq, Omer Riaz, Tenvir Ali, Mujtaba Husnain, and Gyu Sang Choi. (2019). "An Empirical Approach for Extreme Behavior Identification through Tweets Using Machine Learning." Applied Sciences 9 (18):3723.

[23] Vitale, Heather Marie, and James M Keagle. (2014). "A time to tweet, as well as a time to kill: ISIS's projection of power in Iraq and Syria." Defense Horizons (77):1.

[24] Perein, Anita. (2015). "Fatal attraction: Western muslimas and ISIS." Perspectives on Terrorism 9 (3):21-38.

[25] Weinberg, Leonard, and William Eubank. (2008). "Problems with the critical studies approach to the study of terrorism." Critical studies on terrorism 1 (2):185-195.

[26] Sharif, Waqas et al., (2019).

[27] Blaker, Lisa. (2015). "The Islamic States use of online social media." Military Cyber Affairs 1 (1):4.

[28] Weiman, A. (2015). Victims of Terrorism and the Media. Terrorists, Victims and Society: 176-187.

[29] Khosrokhavar, F. (2015). Avrupa Cihadcl. Orient XXI.

[30] Ibid

[31] Ibid

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ISIS Religious and Extremist Propaganda on Social Media: Dictionary-Based Study of Twitter - smallwarsjournal

Facebook is working on a new Neighborhoods feature for the service that aims at connecting users that live close by and for them to socialize within their locality. The feature is supposedly being aimed as a rival offering to services like Nextdoor, which is currently eyeing a $5 billion IPO.

While some leaked screenshots of the feature made it to Twitter back in May, the social networking giant has confirmed to Bloomberg that it is indeed testing the feature in a limited capacity in Calgary, Canada. More than ever, people are using Facebook to participate in their local communities, said a spokesperson in a statement to the publication, adding that the Neighborhoods feature is a dedicated space within Facebook for people to connect with their neighbors.

Social media consultant Matt Navarra shared some screenshots of the feature on Twitter, providing some insight into the setup process and the feature itself. The app confirms users location to set their locality and a profile, after which it offers posts, groups, and content from other users in the neighborhood. Interestingly, Navarra adds that users can create profiles for other users to see even if they are not their Facebook friends.

With Neighborhoods, Facebook aims to bring more private conversations between users of a community, something it has been working on through private groups and the like. However, the firm reminds users through the setup process that all its Community Standards are applicable in Neighborhoods as well, prompting users to be inclusive, kind, and clean. Users are also offered dedicated privacy options for their Neighborhoods, with the option to also switch between or leave these groups altogether.

It will be interesting to see how the company evolves the feature and expands it to more regions. With close to two billion active users monthly, the adoption of such a feature could be much quicker than that of other smaller companies. The impact on rivals like Nextdoor that offer a private social network will also be interesting to keep an eye on.

Source: Bloomberg

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Facebook is working on a new 'Neighborhoods' feature aimed at private, local networking - Neowin

SINGAPORE, Oct. 15, 2020 /PRNewswire/ --Girls in Thailand are singing live to guys in Canada from their phones; rich men in Saudi Arabia are showering gifts on beautiful women in Indonesia; young people around the world are being seemingly randomly matched on video calls based on big data analysis. Now, influenced by the dual growth engine of "live video + short video", video dating has incorporated rich commercial imagination to track players of social products. Recently OyeChat, a video chat app, quietly launched on Google Play, attracting millions of users over only a month, reaching the top 100 best-selling Google Play apps in the Middle East and North America.

OyeChat focuses on social functionality and adds pan-entertainment modules, such as real-time video matching and short music videos. "According to Facebook's sharing data in early 2020, the Top 10 markets for SNS apps include India, the United States, Brazil, Indonesia, Germany, Mexico, Turkey, Pakistan, Egypt, and Thailand, showing that a growing number of national markets need localized social products. OyeChat will prioritize entering markets with less competition, polishing their products, cultivating an ecology, and ultimately moving on to other markets," Key Cheung, head of OyeChat, stated. According to data from App Annie, a third of the best-selling Google Play apps in India are video dating apps, and although they haven't reached a third of market share in Saudi Arabia and the United States, video dating apps are also a very important category on the bestselling list. Competition is fierce due to the profits. The global video chats the Match Group, Meet Group, Biglive, Badoo, Azar, Yalla, Uplive, and other social product giants have long established a foothold due to first-mover advantages. If OyeChat wants to be in the market, they must find a foothold that will differentiate it from the competition.

OyeChat initially targeted Southeast Asia, the Middle East, and North America. It has deployed streamer ecosystems in Vietnam, the Philippines, India, Saudi Arabia, Brazil, and other countries, building its own streamer base. "Our product has innovated targeting female users and helping them communicate and interact users on the other end both simply and effectively, increasing the frequency and depth of and interest in communication and establishing real social relationships with strangers," Key stated. In the live-stream industry, OyeChat has also encouraged excellent streamers to cultivate their own circles, typically 10-20, in addition to cooperating with talent agencies and recruiting and developing its own streamers.

OyeChat's team originated from the Singapore-based company Thor Network Pte., Ltd. In contrast, its operations and R&D members are younger and have a more international perspective. They have worked at many globally listed companies, covering multiple directions, including the network, social networking, and gaming, where they garnered rich experience in global markets and operations. In addition to the advantages that streamer resources in the entertainment industry have brought to bear, OyeChat's product has also worked hard to localize. Compared to traditional social products, OyeChat employs real-time matching to further diversify everyone's interactions with content. A recommendation algorithm is incorporated to manage the matching process to recommend matches between men and women based on factors, such as interests, personalities, and geographic locations. Unlike other products with the same purview, OyeChat is more likely to have female users command the rhythm of communication. Not to mention,users can experience real-time beautification, masks, and cartoonification to transform themselves. Real-time chat translation is also featured, and viewers can give gifts to their favorite streamers to increase the entertainment value while chatting. Let's not forget that OyeChat is different from traditional live broadcasting by allowing the streamer to create personal 1-on-1 channels with users, creating a better communication experience. The streamer can also easily switch from multi-channel communication to single-channel communication, which is both easy and simple. Key stated that even the best profitable product, if it lacks operational capabilities, will be reduced to a shell of itself. I have been using it before, and now I feel that this product has matured to the proper iteration. It is being cautious, taking itself seriously, and polishing all its features.

SOURCE OyeChat

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Following the Dating Bonus, Another Social Product, OyeChat, Made Its Debut - PRNewswire

The Posts hyping of the story as some cataclysmic bombshell was overblown. While these emails, if authenticated, provide some new details and corroboration, the broad outlines of this story have long been known: Hunter was paid a very large monthly sum by Burisma at the same time that his father was quite active in using the force of the U.S. Government to influence Ukrainesinternal affairs.

Along with emails relating to Burisma, the New York Post also gratuitously published several photographs of Hunter, who has spoken openly and commendably of his past struggles with substance abuse, in what appeared to various states of drug use. There was no conceivable public interest in publishing those, and every reason not to.

The Posts explanation of how these documents were obtained is bizarre at best: They claim that Hunter Biden indefinitely left his laptop containing the emails at a repair store, and the stores owner, alarmed by the corruption theyrevealed, gave the materials from the hard drive to the FBI and then to Rudy Giuliani.

While there is no proof that Biden followed through on any of Hunters promises to Burisma, there is no reason, at least thus far, to doubt that the emails are genuine. And if they are genuine, they at least add to what is undeniably a relevant and newsworthy story involving influence-peddling relating to Hunter Bidens work in Ukraine and his trading on the name and power of his father, now the front-runner in the 2020 presidential election.

But the Post, for all its longevity, power and influence, ran smack into two entities far more powerful than it: Facebook and Twitter. Almost immediately upon publication, pro-Biden journalists created a climate of extreme hostility and suppression toward the Post story, making clear that anyjournalisteven mentioningit would be roundly attacked. For the crime of simply noting the story on Twitter (while pointing out its flaws), New York Times reporter Maggie Haberman was instantly vilified to the point where her name, along with the phrase MAGA Haberman, were trending on Twitter.

(That Habermanis a crypto-Trump supporter is preposterousfor so many reasons, including the fact that she is responsible for countless front-page Times stories that reflect negatively on the president; moreover,the 2016 Clinton campaign considered Haberman one of their most favorable reporters).

The two Silicon Valley giants saw that hostile climate and reacted. Just two hours after the story was online, Facebook intervened. The company dispatched a life-long Democratic Party operative who now works for Facebook Andy Stone, previously a communications operative for Democratic Sen. Barbara Boxer and the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, among other D.C. Democratic jobs to announce that Facebook was reducing [the articles] distribution on our platform: in other words, tinkering with its own algorithms to suppress the ability of users to discuss or share the news article. The long-time Democratic Party official did not try to hide his contempt for the article, beginning his censorship announcement by snidely noting: I will intentionally not link to the New York Post.

Even more astonishing still, Twitter locked the account of the New York Post, banning the paper from posting any content all day and, evidently, into Thursday morning. The last tweet from the paper was posted at roughly 2:00 p.m. ET on Wednesday.

And then, on Thursday morning, the Post published a follow-up article using the same archive of materials, this one purporting to detailefforts by the former vice presidents son to pursue lucrative deals with a Chinese energy company by using his fathers name.Twitter is now alsobanning the sharing or posting of links to that article as well.

In sum, the two Silicon Valley giants, with little explanation, united to prevent the sharing anddissemination of this article. As Los Angeles Times reporter Matt Pearce put it, Facebook limiting distribution is a bit like if a company that owned newspaper delivery trucks decided not to drive because it didnt like a story. Does a truck company edit the newspaper? It does now, apparently.

That the First Amendment right of free speech is inapplicable to these questions goes without saying. That constitutional guarantee restricts the actions of governments, not private corporations such as Facebook and Twitter.

But glibly pointing this out does not come close to resolving this controversy. That actions by gigantic corporations are constitutional does not mean that they arebenign.

State censorship is not the only kind of censorship. Private-sector repression of speech and thought, particularly in the internet era, can be as dangerous and consequential. Imagine, for instance, if these two Silicon Valley giants united with Google to declare:henceforth we will ban all content that is critical of President Trump and/or the Republican Party, but will actively promote criticisms of Joe Biden and the Democrats.

Would anyone encounter difficultly understanding why such adecreewould constitute dangerous corporate censorship? Would Democrats respond to such a policyby simply shrugging it off on the radical libertarian ground that private corporations have the right to do whatever they want? To ask that question is to answer it.

To begin with, Twitter and particularly Facebook are no ordinary companies. Facebook, asthe owner not just of its massive social media platform but also other key communication services it has gobbled up such as Instagram and WhatsApp, is one of the most powerful companies ever to exist, if not the most powerful. In June,the House Judiciary Subcommittee on Antitrust, Commercial, and Administrative Law launched an investigation into the consolidated power of Facebook and three other companies Google, Amazon and Apple and just last week issued a sweeping reportwhich, as Ars Technica explained, found:

Facebook outright has monopoly power in the market for social networking, and that power is firmly entrenched and unlikely to be eroded by competitive pressure from anyone at all due to high entry barriersincluding strong network effects, high switching costs, and Facebooks significant data advantagethat discourage direct competition by other firms to offer new products and services.

In his New York Times op-ed last October, the left-wing expert on monopoly powerMatt Stoller described Facebook and Google as global monopolies sitting astride public discourse, and recounted how bipartisan policy and legal changes designed to whittle away antitrust protections have bestowed the two tech giants with a radical centralization of power over the flow of information. And he warns that this unprecedented consolidation of control over our discourse is close to triggeringthe collapse of journalism and democracy.

It has been astonishing to watch Democratsover the last twenty-four hours justify this censorship on the grounds that private corporations are entitled to do whatever they want. Not even radical free-market libertarians espouse such a pro-corporate view. Even the most ardent capitalist recognizes that companies that wield monopoly or quasi-monopoly power have an obligation to act in the public interest, and areanswerable to the public regarding whether they are doing so.

That is why in both the EU and increasingly the U.S., there are calls from across the political spectrumto either break up Facebook onantitrust and monopoly grounds or regulate it as a public utility, the way electric and water companies and AT&T have been. Almost nobody in the democratic world believes that Facebook is just some ordinary company that should be permitted to exercise unfettered power and act without constraints of any kind. Indeed, Facebooks monumental political and economic power greater than most if not all the governments of nation-states is themajor impediment to such reforms.

Beyond that, both Facebook and Twitter receive substantial, unique legal benefits from federal law,further negating the claim that they are free to do whatever they want as private companies. Just as is true of Major League Baseball which is subject to regulation by Congress as a result of the antitrust exemption they enjoy under the law these social media companies receive a very valuable and particularized legal benefit in the form of Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act, which shields themfrom any liability for content published ontheir platforms, including defamatory material or other legally proscribed communications.

No company can claim such massive, unique legal exemptions from the federal law and then simultaneously claim they owe no duties to the public interest andare not answerable to anyone. To advocate that is a form of authoritarian corporatism: simultaneously allowing tech giants to claim legally conferred privileges and exemptionswhile insisting that they can act without constraints of any kind.

Then there is the practical impactof Twitter and Facebook uniting to block content published by a major newspaper. It is true in theory that one can still read the suppressed article by visiting the New York Post website directly, but the stranglehold that these companies exert over our discourse is so dominant that their censorship amounts to effective suppression of the reporting.

In 2018, Pew Research found that about two-thirds of U.S. adults (68%) get news on social media sites. One-in-five get news there often. The combination of Facebook, Google and Twitter controls the information received by huge numbers of Americans, Pew found. Facebook is still far and away the site Americans most commonly use for news.About four-in-ten Americans (43%) get news on Facebook. The next most commonly used site for news is YouTube [owned by Google], with 21% getting news there, followed by Twitter at 12%.

While Twitter still falls short of Facebook in terms of number of users, a 2019 report found that Twitter remains the leading social network among journalists at 83%. Censoring a story from Twitter thus has disproportionate impact by hiding it from the people who determine and shape the news.

The grave dangers posed by the censorship actions of yesterday should be self-evident. Just over two weeks before a presidential election, Silicon Valley giants whose industry leaders and workforce overwhelmingly favorthe Democratic candidate took extraordinary steps to block millions, perhaps tens of millions, of American voters from being exposed to what purports to be a major expos by one of the countrys oldest and largest newspapers.

As the New York Times put it in an article in March about the political preferences of tech leaders: Silicon Valley has long leaned blue. Large numbers of tech executives, including Facebooks second-in-command Sheryl Sandberg, were also vocally supportive of Hillary Clinton in 2016. At the very least, the perception, if not the reality, has been created that these tech giants are using their unprecedented power over political and election-related information to prevent the dissemination of negative reporting about the presidential candidate they favor. Whatever that is, it is not democratic or something to cheer.

The rationale offered by both Twitter and Facebook to justify this censorship makes it more alarming, not less. Twitter claimed that the Post article violates its so-called Hacked Materials Policy, which it says permits commentary on or discussion about hacked materials, such as articles that cover them but do not include or link to the materials themselves; in other words, Twitter allows links to articles about hacked materials but bans links to or images of hacked material themselves.

Thecompanyadded that their policy prohibits the use of our service to distribute content obtained without authorization because, they said, theydont want to incentivize hacking by allowing Twitter to be used as distribution for possibly illegally obtained materials.

But that standard, if taken seriously and applied consistently, would result in the banningfrom the platform of huge amounts of the most important and consequential journalism. After all, alarge bulk of journalism is enabled by sources providing content obtained without authorization to journalists, who then publish it.

Indeed, many of the most celebrated and significant stories of the lastseveral decades the Pentagon Papers, the WikiLeaks Collateral Murder video and war logs, the Snowden reporting, the Panama Papers, the exposs from the Brazil Archive we reported over the last year relied upon publication of various forms of hacked materials provided by sources. The same is true of the DNC and Podesta emails that exposed corruption and forcedthe 2016 resignation of the top five officials of the Democratic National Committee.

Does anyone think it would be justifiable or politically healthy for tech giants to bar access to those documents of historic importance in journalism and politics? That is what the Twitter policy, taken on its face, would require.

For that matter, why is Twitter not blocking access to the ongoing New York Times articles that disclose the contents of President Trumps tax returns, the unauthorized disclosure of which is a crime? Why did those platforms not block links to the now-notorious Rachel Maddow segment where she revealed details about one of Trumps old tax returns on the ground that it was content obtained without authorization? Or what about the virtually daily articles in the New York Times, Washington Post, NBC News and others that explicitly state they are publishing information that the source is unauthorized to disclose: how does that not fall squarely within the banning policy as Twitter defined it yesterday?

Worse still, why does Twitters hacking policy apply to the New York Post story at all? While the Posts claimsabout how these emails were obtained are dubious at best, there is no evidence unlike the award-winning journalism scoops referenced above that they were obtained by virtue of hacking by a source.

Facebooks rationale for suppression that it needs to have its fact checking partners verify the story before allowing it to be spread poses different but equally alarming dangers. What makes Mark Zuckerbergs social media company competent to fact check the work of other journalists? Why did Facebook block none of the endless orgy of Russiagate conspiracy theoriesfrom major media outlets that were completely unproven if not outright false?

Do we really want Facebook serving as some sort of uber-editor for U.S. media and journalism, deciding what information is suitable for the American public to read and which should be hidden from it after teams of journalists and editors at real media outlets have approved its publication? And can anyone claim that Facebooks alleged fact-checking process is applied with any remote consistency given how often they failed to suppress sketchily sourced or facially unreliable stories such as, say, the Steele Dossier and endless articles based on it? Can you even envision the day when an unproven conspiracy theory leaked by the CIA or FBI to the Washington Post or NBC News is suppressed pending fact-checking by Facebook?

Twitter is not opposed to hacked materials and Facebook is not opposed to dubiously sourced stories. They are opposed to such things only when such storiesanger powerful factions. When those power centers are the ones disseminating such stories, they will continue to have free rein to do so.

The glaring fallacy that alwayslies at the heart of pro-censorship sentimentsis the gullible, delusional belief that censorship powers will be deployed only to suppress views one dislikes, but never ones own views. The most cursory review of history, and the most minimal understanding of how these tech giants function, instantly reveals the folly of that pipe dream.

Facebook is not some benevolent, kind, compassionate parent or a subversive, radical actor who is going to police our discourse in order to protect the weak and marginalized or serve as a noble check on mischief by the powerful. They are almost always going to do exactly the opposite: protect the powerful from those who seek toundermine elite institutions and reject their orthodoxies.

Tech giants, like all corporations, are required by law to have one overriding objective: maximizing shareholder value. They are always going to use their power to appease thosethey perceive wield the greatest political and economic power.

That is why Facebook accepts virtually every request from the Israeli Government to remove the pages of Palestinian journalists and activists on the grounds of incitement, but almost never accepts Palestinians requests to remove Israeli content. It is the same reason Facebook blocks and censors governments adverse to the U.S., but not the other way around. They are going to heed the interests ofthepowerful at the expense of those who lack it. It is utter madness to want to augment their censorship powers or to expect they will use it for any other ends.

Facebook and Twitter havein the past censored the content or removed the accounts of far-right voices. They have done the same to left-wing voices. That is always how it will work: it is exclusively the voices on the fringesandthe margins, the dissidents, those who reside outside of the factions of power who will be subjected to this silencing. Mainstream political and media voices, and the U.S. Government and its allies, will be fully free to spread conspiracy theories and disinformation without ever being subjected to these illusory rules.

Censorship power, like the tech giants who now wield it, is an instrument of status quo preservation. The promise of the internet from the start was that it would be a tool of liberation, of egalitarianism, by permitting those without money and power to compete on fair terms in the information war with the most powerful governments and corporations.

But just as is true of allowing the internet to be converted into a tool of coercion and mass surveillance, nothing guts that promise, that potential, like empowering corporate overloads and unaccountable monopolists to regulate and suppress what can be heard.

To observethat those who are cheering for this today because they happen to like this particular outcome are being short-sighted and myopic is to woefully understate the case. The only people who should want to live in a world where Mark Zuckerberg andSundar Pichai and Jeff Bezos have a stranglehold on what can be said and heard are those whose actions are devoted to the perpetuation of their power and who benefit from their hegemony.

Everyone else will eventually be faced with the choice of conformity or censorship, of refraining from expressing prohibited views as the cost for maintaining access to crucial social media platforms.The only thing more authoritarian than the acts of Facebook and Twitter yesterday is the mentality that causes ordinary people to cheer it, to be grateful for the power and control they have long wielded andyesterday finally unleashed.

Update: Oct. 16, 2020, 6:18a.m. ETLateThursday evening, Twitter announced changes to its Hacked Materials Policydesigned to address concerns that its policy as stated and as applied to the Post articles would result in the banning of crucial reporting based on hacked materials or other unauthorized disclosures. Explainedby Vijaya Gadde, a top Twitter executive, the new rules now provide that Twitterspolicy applies not to articles by news outlets reporting on hacked materials but only in those cases when the hacked material is directly shared by hackers or those acting in concert with them. Additionally, going forward, Twitter will label Tweets to provide context instead of blocking links from being shared. Gadde said specifically that the changes are intended to address the concerns that there could be many unintended consequences to journalists, whistleblowers and others in ways that are contrary to Twitters purpose of serving the public conversation.

There are still serious concerns about what Twitter did in this particular case and how these rules will be appliedto future cases, but these changes are a commendablyresponsive effort to minimize the dangers of this policy and alleviatethe concerns raised by journalists and transparency advocates.

See the rest here:
Facebook and Twitter Cross a Line in Censorship - The Intercept

After a brief chat on the phone, I was informed that I was unwittingly caught up in aRussian-backed media operation, for a publication that had recently offered a writing opportunity.

The outlet PeaceData reached out to me through one of their associate editors (@Alex_Lacusta) via DM on July 8, writing, were a young, progressive global news outlet that is seeking young and aspiring writers. I was told that the editors liked my writing and views, and was initially offered $200 to $250 per piece. (Photo above: Jason Howie CC BY 2.0)

I went back and forth with Alex, while in the meantime I checked out the editors social media pages on Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn, the pieces that were published (which generally aligned with my values), and contributors which included some Twitter blue checks and leftist journalists, adding to the operations legitimacy. After exercising due diligence and expressing interest in the opportunity, Alex dropped the rate to $100 to $150 per piece, with the hook that I could write a regular column. Alex informed me I could choose the topics so long as they focused on anti-war, anti-corruption, and environmentalism. I accepted and was excited to have a home and compensation for my work.

After talking to the reporter who DMed me, I was sent areportdetailing how the Russian oligarch-sponsored troll farm Internet Research Agency was behind the PeaceData front. I was initially shocked and confused, but in retrospect, the red flags added up.

On July 22, I noticed the first red flag. Alex and Albert Popescu, another associate editor for PeaceData had eerily similar profile pictures which turned out to be digitally generated fake images. Popescus account was also recently created in May 2020. The second odd occurrence happened in email exchanges with Alex. Prepositions were sometimes omitted and verbiage would be singular rather than plural, or vice versa. Yet, I had been in contact with busy editors for legitimate publications that would make grammatical mistakes here and there. I was also paid by three separate Paypal accounts, which seemed suspicious.

The last red flag was the most egregious and led me to distance myself. I had been notified that my first article arguing that U.S. sanctions and the embargo against Venezuela were not about enforcinghuman rights was republished inGlobal Research Centre, a conspiracy blog that I was unfamiliar with at the time. I looked briefly on their home page and saw articles that were critical of U.S. foreign policy, the U.S. government response to the dismal state of current affairs, and capitalist hegemony. About a week later, I was scrolling through mind-numbingQAnonposts on Twitter and noticed that the Q accounts were sharing hydroxychloroquine propaganda that was linked from Global Research.

I was disturbed and didnt want my thorough, well-sourced work to be associated with a conspiracy blog. I started digging. Along with hydroxychloroquine conspiracies, I found 9/11 truther articles and pro-Putin content. I started diving through the PeaceData archive and found some vaguely pro-Putin content, notably one article defending Belarussian authoritarian Alexander Lukashenkos state violence on demonstrators. I then decided that I didnt want to be associated with PeaceData any longer. Unfortunately, I had already submitted my final piece by this point.

In the days and weeks following September 1, I was (and still am) constantly inundated with requests for comment from outlets. I initially talked to reporters off the record, as I thought this experience would ruin aspirations of becoming more frequently published. As a journalist committed to transparency and as a Socialist, I lost sleep over my involvement with a reactionary regime that I have been previously critical of. After mulling it over for a night, I opted for transparency and went on therecord. I turned over my emails and PayPal receipts to reporters and provided statements to those who reached out. I was never contacted by law enforcement.

In the time between my final piece being submitted and then later published, Twitter and thenFacebooksuspended all PeaceData linked accounts, following a tip from the National Security Agency (NSA) and the Federal Bureau of Investigations. I was caught up in the fallout. Twitter blanket suspended every single account I ever had access to, relaying that I was manipulating the platform for accessing multiple accounts.

My account, my former employers accounts, and a Democratic Socialists of America (DSA) linked account were all suspended due to their association with my digital footprint. I had not used my former employers account since April 2019 and I hadnt posted anything on the DSA associated account since about March 2019. None of these accounts, except my account, had any relation with PeaceData.

After I noticed that every account I ever had access to was suspended, I reached out to two reporters who had been following the story and I had been speaking with. I trusted them, as they were among most of (but not all) the journalists who didnt misquote me or editorialize in their write-ups.

I flagged the account suspensions and they requested comment from Twitter. At first, a spokesperson failed to respond to either. It wasnt until one of the reporters tweeted about it, highlighting that Twitter had suspended a journalists account along with other associated accounts, calling it ridiculous. Following the reporters post to get the accounts reinstated, all were reactivated about three hours after the tweet. Twitters spokespeople then responded to one of the requests for comment, stating, we suspended these accounts out of an abundance of caution.

I was told candidly that had the reporter not posted about it, my account and those associated would likely have been suspended longer or permanently banned. Fortunately, my former employer didnt notice or at least didnt reach out. On the other hand, DSA comrades were quick to notice and didnt seem pleased with my involvement in getting one of their accounts suspended. I was deeply apologetic, offered an honest account on the situation, and elected to remove myself immediately when the account was reinstated.

Sadly, I wasnt the only one affected in the PeaceData mess. Others were also thrown under the bus by a social media corporation not exercising due diligence and overreacting. Over 200 independent journalists were implicated, including Jacinda Chan, a person with a complex disability, whose account was temporarily purged from Facebook.

Chan told theDaily Beastthat after her suspension she was unable to find a caregiver in assisting her daily living, as she used Facebook to find home health aides. When pressed for comment, Facebook cited her posts as advertisements, telling theDaily Beast, its against company policy for users to either attempt to or successfully sell, buy or exchange site privileges or Facebook product features, including attempting to complete the U.S. authorizations process on behalf of another individual. Public relations spin aside, a spokesperson for the networking site later stated that the moderators planned to reinstate Chans account.

While understandable that Twitter and Facebook were attempting to mitigate the influence of a Russian oligarch-sponsored media campaign that targeted leftist journalists and independent media, likeCounterPunch, the blanket suspension demonstrates how tech giants keep their procedures under tight wraps. Ultimately, big tech and social media platforms arent transparent and are only accountable to negative press and revenue streams, rather than serving the public interest. The motivating rationale driving their irresponsibility and unaccountable actions: profit and consolidating market share.

Social Media And Tech Giants Arent Accountable To The Public

The tech oligopolies and monopolies and particularly social media corporations are not accountable to the public and lack meaningful regulation. The industry creates corrosive environments for democratic societies. The result allows for users and workers to be manipulated and exploited so that the industry can secure market share and profits.

The proliferation of conspiracy across the ideological spectrum has seeped into the mainstream through social media. The most flagrant pushing of conspiratorial dogmatism is through QAnon, which evolved from a fringe online conspiracy to being embraced byTrump,far-right popular media, and now propelled into themainstream, giving it cult-like status.

As of October 2, 2020, 75 Republicans, two Democrats, one Libertarian, and three independent candidates are espousing sympathies for Q in the election season. There are nowmillionsof users and thousands of groups across social networking sites that are dedicated true-believers to Q. Thedelayedmeasures from social media platforms have resulted in the conspiracy metastasizing, causing Q to spread and adherents committing acts of fascistterrorismin the name of stopping the cabal and those that oppose Trumpian autocracy.

Outlandish online conspiracy isnt limited to the fringes or far-right: liberals have also fallen prey to false realities. In the U.K.s Prime Minister runoff, Socialist Labourite Jeremy Corbyn was the center of a conspiracy thatsmearedthe former anti-apartheid activist as an anti-semite and terrorist sympathizer. While theBritishandAmericanpress abetted this narrative, social media users on the right and center endlessly shared this fake news to discredit Corbyn.

During the 2020 Democratic Primary,prominent liberalspromoted conspiracy that U.S. SenatorBernie Sanderswas awittingRussian asset, while also likening his supporters toNazi brownshirts. Given his background and prior statements denouncing Putins far-right regime, like the smears Corbyn faced, these claims were completely beyond the pale.

Even the left dabbles in conspiracy on social media, with some elements outright dismissing the Trump-Russia connection or the reactionary tendencies of Putins regime as U.S. intelligence propaganda. Yet given the long history of the intelligence and foreign policy apparatus outright lying (remember theGulf of Tonkincharade or the WMDs in Iraq or James Clappers testimony before Congress?), the skepticism is more understandable. Furthermore, the corporate media obsession and Democratic Party reductionism of blaming the entirety of the U.S.s failures on a Russian Manchurian candidate and Putin hacking the election also dissuades the left in realizing that far-right governments like Russia, Israel, Turkey, and Saudi Arabia have an interest in influencing U.S. politics.

Social media platforms, along with corporate media, have allowed nefarious actors to push narratives to audiences while either under- or overreacting in their responses depending on the ideological underpinnings from foreign-linked information. For example, reactionary propaganda from Israel and Saudi Arabia client states of the U.S. mostly go unchallenged andcritical viewsare met with censorship. Conversely, some credible reports citing the U.S. governments incompetence or imperialist brutality from outlets likeTeleSur(essentially Venezuelan state media) are more frequentlycensored. With that said, censorship of Russian information is more nuanced, and appears that its ideological framework resembles the Cold War tactics of yesteryear, rather than overt ideological or economic biases.

Twitter and Facebook have only recently started labeling content as manipulated media or removing posts, mostly opting for the former. While the platforms have started issuing this tag, posts arestill visibleto users. Facebook has recently moved toremoveusers and groups promoting QAnon. While likely for the best, this should be approached with careful skepticism and challenged as the removal of content and accounts could ultimately be used (it already has been) against the left and independent media. Its a bit of a catch-22. Free speech and press freedoms should be vigilantly protected, yet its no question that allowing conspiracy dissemination on social media is pushing segments of the public into mythological existences. The environment is a threat to democratic societies.

While allowing users to be constantly bombarded with conspiratorial misinformation, manipulated media, or fake news, social networking corporations have gobbled up the competition, creating a consolidated market for consumers.Facebookhas swallowed up WhatsApp, Instagram, Oculus, and have been exploring the prospect of acquiring other tech-based services, whileTwitterhas acquired Periscope, Tweetdeck, and other platforms. Consolidation isnt exclusive to Facebook and Twitter. Other tech corporations are acquiring competitors and skirtingantitrust lawswhile remaining mostly unregulated and unaccountable to the public.

Uber hasignored pressurefor improved screening processes for gig workers and ensuring that riders (especiallywomen) are kept safe. The ride-sharing tech duopoly (along with Lyft) has been accused ofripping offworking-class drivers andthreatened capital strikes.

Google run by tech conglomerate Alphabet failed to safeguardusers data from the NSAs domestic spying program and has beenaccusedof selling off data, which the corporation hasdenied.

Tesla and SpaceX founder, Elon Musk, has violated labor laws after issuing statementsintimidatingworkers that wished to unionize, while the Securities and Exchange Commission hascitedthe South African billionaire for blatant fraud.

Apple has been caughtdodgingtaxes and working with the exploitative Taiwanese manufacturer,Foxconn, which installed nets to prevent suicides after 14 workers took their own lives due to the conditions. Apples manufacturer has also made workers sign agreements that they wont take their own lives due to the abysmal environment.

Techs top firm, Amazon, has been widely documented violating federal labor laws and engaging in exploitative practices: firing andsmearingpro-union workers, denying safe andappropriate accommodations, and forcing workers to dedicate uncompensated time to beingfriskedat the end of shifts. Jeff Bezoss monopoly has also recentlydonatedto a QAnon-supporting GOP candidate for the Tennessee House of Representatives.

As the tech industry now becomes evermore consolidated and shady business practices mostly go unpunished, profits and executive salaries are reaching an all-time high. According toFortune Uber, Facebook, Dell, Comcast, Microsoft, Tesla, Alphabet (Google), AT&T, Samsung, Verizon, Apple, and Amazon are among the 300 most profitable corporations in the world.

The tech executives, including social media moguls Jack Dorsey and Mark Zuckerberg, have made out like bandits. According toForbes, Dorseys net worth is now up to$8.4 billion, while Zuckerberg has become the third richest person in the world, amassing a net worth of$92 billion. Similarly, whileAmazonescapes tax obligations, Jeff Bezos now the worlds wealthiest individual has acquired his very own media outfit,The Washington Post, while his net worth skyrockets to an absurd$181.7 billion.

The industry and their robber baron executives are unaccountable and uninterested in protecting a democratic society the result amounts to users and the public paying the price for big techs consolidation, profits, and salaries.

Democratic Ownership Creates Accountability

Tech behemoths have transformed into public (although privately held) services that virtually every American interacts with regularly.Over a thirdof Westerners look to social media for their news consumption, now with more young people turning to online platforms to get their media fix.69 percentof Americans are Facebook users, while73 percentconsistently consume content on Youtube (owned by Google). Close totwo-thirdsof the U.S. use Amazon, while more than 40 percent use the site monthly.36 percentof Americans use ride-sharing platforms like Uber and Lyft, while every American with a computer or cellphone (a necessity in this era) mostly relies on a binary choice. In a world where the masses are increasingly reliant on tech platforms, its time they serve public transparency and are held accountable under democratic ownership.

Under democratic ownership, speech can be better protected from corporate censorship, and responsiveness to manipulated media or fake news can be better addressed through independent procedural transparency. Its noteworthy that as media and information channels progress, some Western governments have created editorially independent outlets, likeBBCandCBC. Although these institutions are far from perfect and certainly possess a bias towards the status quo, their creation didnt deliver an authoritarian blow to free speech. The same can be applied to social media corporations.

In an oligopolistic or arguably monopolistic environment, big tech and social media monoliths have become too large to manage and hold accountable. Tech giants have increasing political, economic, and social power over the public, while the working-class people become growingly reliant on the platforms. It should be recognized that big techs jumping-off point was created and is now sustained throughpublic funding. Public investments should serve the public, not shareholders, executives, and market consolidation.

Nationalization would also curtail overly exploitative labor practices from big tech and their contractors. While under democratic ownership, labor standards could be more strictly enforced and dignified, high-paying jobs can be promoted. Simultaneously, users and consumers wouldnt be manipulated for profit, personal data could be better secured and protected, and the public could have an independent arbiter to rely on for information. Public ownership serves to protect democratic societies, workers, and users.

At its heart, the profit motive doesnt serve the publics interest and its time that tech giants are nationalized and placed under democratic control. While conspiracies run wild, tech consolidates, users are manipulated, and data is unsecured and auctioned off, democratic societies are at a precipice. Big tech and social media corporations must be placed under democratic ownership for the sake of accountability and transparency to the public.

(Jack Delaneyis a former policy analyst. He worked on issues relating to health care, disability, and labor policy, and is a member of the National Writers Union. Posted first at Counterpunch.org.)

-cw

Read more here:
It's Time to Nationalize Social Media and Big Tech - City Watch