Social Media: Behind the Scenes2013 week 09
ASTROTURFING
President Richard M. Nixon had White House staffers write «letters to the editor» to various American newspapers, purporting
to be from ordinary citizens who favored Nixon's policies.
william shakespeare
Et tu, Brute?
william shakespeare - Julius Caesar, 1599
CaesarBrutusCassiusI will this night, in several hands, in at his windows throw,As if they came from several citizens, Writings all tending to the great opinionThat Rome holds of his name; wherein obscurely Caesar's ambition shall be glanced at
william shakespeare - Julius Caesar, 1599
A false or simulated «grass roots» movement that’s really a Viral Marketing campaign.
Astroturf
GrassrootA grassroots movement is one driven by the politics of a community.
The term implies that the creation of the movement and the group supporting it are natural and spontaneous.
One whose sole reason for participating in a discussion or forum is to support,
or express agreement with another participant.
A pseudonym used by someone to distance themselves from their actions,
especially to talk about themselves in the guise of a neutral observer
Bootstrapping in business means starting a business without external help or capital.
Bootstrapping
ASTROTURFING 2.0
Puppet mastering
‣ Companies now use "persona management software"
‣ This software creates all the online furniture a real person would possess: a name, email accounts, web pages and social media.
‣ Fake accounts can be kept updated by automatically reposting or linking to content generated elsewhere
‣ Human astroturfers can then be assigned these "pre-aged" accounts to create a back story
‣ Software can create "static IP addresses" for each persona, enabling different astroturfers "to look like the same person over time".
‣ The US Army is building such software
bit.ly/scpo-09-02
bit.ly/scpo-09-03
bit.ly/scpo-09-04
ASTROTURFINGIN POLITICS
CHINA
网�水�
280.000 employees
Water army
50 cents party
bit.ly/scpo-09-05
网�水�
a group of Internet ghostwriters paid to post online comments with particular content.Online Chinese companies, the Chinese Gov. and the Communist Party of China employ people to make postings on social media in order to change public opinion.
Water army
50 cents party
bit.ly/scpo-09-06
KOREA
dec. 2012
bit.ly/scpo-09-09
National Intelligence Service «Cyberwarfare Command» busted
Won Sei-hoonHead of Secret Services
Park Geun-hyePresident of South Korea
Won Sei-hoonHead of Secret Services
Moon Jae-inOpponent
Park Geun-hyePresident of South Korea
Won Sei-hoonHead of Secret Services
55,700 tweetsone week prior to presidential election
bashing president Park Geun-hye’s opponent
http://fr.slideshare.net/newstapa/south-korean-spy-agencys-illegal-campaigning-on-sns
Aug 14th 2013 - Seoul
EUROPE
EU Troll Patrol
bit.ly/scpo-09-07
• 2m€ budget
• Monitoring conversation
• Sentiment Analysis
• Inhouse trained ‘troll patrol’ team
• acting as EU official (no AT here)
EU Troll Patrol
FRANCE
Manuel VallsFrance’s Homeland Security State Sec.
ASTROTURFINGIN MARKETING
BOOTSTRAPPINGA STARTUP
Steve HuffmanReddit Cofounder
‘You would go to Reddit in the early days, the first couple of months and there’d be tons of... fake users’
bit.ly/scpo-09-08
BASHING COMPETITION
Samsung got busted setting up a PR campaign that involved paying off Taiwanese students to write negative reviews of HTC's products.
A ‘cash for comment’ scandal
taiwansamsungleaks.org
bit.ly/scpo-09-11
bit.ly/scpo-09-10
ASTROTURFINGIN eREPUTATION
FAKE JOURNALISM
bit.ly/scpo-09-13bit.ly/scpo-09-12
Nicolas Arpagian