Begin typing your search above and press return to search.
proflie-avatar
Login
exit_to_app
Democracy that banks on the electorate
access_time 28 March 2024 5:34 AM GMT
Lessons to learn from Moscow terror attack
access_time 27 March 2024 6:10 AM GMT
Gaza
access_time 26 March 2024 4:34 AM GMT
The poison is not in words, but inside
access_time 25 March 2024 5:42 AM GMT
A witchhunt, plain and simple
access_time 23 March 2024 9:35 AM GMT
DEEP READ
Schools breeding hatred
access_time 14 Sep 2023 10:37 AM GMT
Ukraine
access_time 16 Aug 2023 5:46 AM GMT
Ramadan: Its essence and lessons
access_time 13 March 2024 9:24 AM GMT
When ‘Jai Sree Ram’ becomes a death call
access_time 15 Feb 2024 9:54 AM GMT
exit_to_app
Homechevron_rightWorldchevron_rightAttempt to influence...

Attempt to influence US elections traced on Twitter, says a new study by RAND Corporation

text_fields
bookmark_border
Attempt to influence US elections traced on Twitter, says a new study by RAND Corporation
cancel

New York: A new study from non-profit RAND Corporation says that a coordinated effort has been going on via Twitter to influence the upcoming US presidential election. The social media interference by some elements aims to sow distrust, exacerbate political divisions and undermine confidence in American democracy

The tactics the researchers observed on Twitter mirror Russia's longstanding strategy of playing off existing partisan tensions to create a sense of disunity among US voters, and they also further Russia's interests, claimed the report.

However, the researchers could not definitively attribute this year's election interference to a specific actor.

This orchestrated activity may have worked in favour of President Donald Trump, and against the candidacy of Joe Biden, according to the report.

"Social media has made it cheaper and easier for foreign actors to mount increasingly sophisticated attacks on our democracy and our political discourse," said William Marcellino, the study's lead author and a social and behavioural scientist at RAND.

"Many Americans are immersed in online conversations that have been shaped artificially, and that are giving them a false and distorted picture of the world."

The latest study used software tools developed by RAND to analyse a very large dataset of 2.2 million tweets from 630,391 unique Twitter accounts collected between January 1 and May 6.

The analysis found that trolls -- fake personas that spread hyper-partisan themes -- and super-connectors, which are highly networked accounts, overwhelmingly cluster in certain Twitter communities engaged in political conversations around the election.

The RAND report is the second of a four-part series intended to help policymakers and the public understand - and mitigate - the threat of online foreign interference in national, state and local elections.

The first report concluded that the main goal of foreign interference is to paralyse the American political process by driving people to extreme positions that make it ever more difficult to reach consensus.

(This report is from IANS feed with minor edits)

Show Full Article
TAGS:#2020 US Presidential ElectionTech UpdatesTwitterNew Study
Next Story