In troubled times, propaganda becomes a war in itself, and unless they say so Pentagonwho ordered a A comprehensive overview of information warfare operations conducted through social media. The information was revealed by The Washington Post after Meta (formerly Facebook’s parent company) and Twitter identified fake accounts on their platforms with links to the United States military.
Through anonymous interviews with officials responsible for the defense of the United States, The Washington Post confirms that Colin Kahl, the assistant secretary for policy at the Department of Defense, has ordered all branches of the armed forces to conduct influence campaigns through social media. In addition to online activity, they also had to report the following month.
The Pentagon-ordered review appears to be a forced move after Graphika and the Stanford Internet Observatory released a report showing a series of operations targeting promote pro-Western narratives in countries such as Russia, China and Afghanistanall of them rival the United States, so to speak.
The report is based on data provided by the company Twitter and Meta, which removed pro-Western influencer networks from their platforms in July and August. Both companies justified their actions with their own rules that prohibit manipulation and inauthentic coordinated activities.
Because the pro-Western manipulation network operated through fake accounts, researchers were unable to conclusively attribute its origin, but it is clear to them that “consistently promoted narratives in favor of the interests of the United States and its allies” while also referring to news sites supported by the US government and military.
The Washington Post reports that the White House and officials from various federal agencies are increasingly concerned about the use of covert operations like those described in the report, so a review has been ordered.
As we said at the beginning, propaganda becomes a war in itself, so the involvement of the United States military in these issues is far from new, to the extent that there is a term psychological operations or psyops. However, the use of fictional people and fake media is something relatively new and is causing controversy. In this case, data provided by Meta and Twitter revealed accounts using AI-generated faces and in some cases posing as representatives of fictitious, supposedly independent media organizations.
With such tactics, the United States military is playing a game similar to the disinformation campaigns of the GRU, Russia’s Central Intelligence Agency. Obviously, no one doubts that the Pentagon will continue its psychological operations, but given the concerns of the White House and other agencies about the formalities, it may conduct them according to less controversial procedures.
