[HN Gopher] Chinese disinformation targeting U.S. features fake ...
___________________________________________________________________
Chinese disinformation targeting U.S. features fake people on fake
news programs
Author : CharlesW
Score : 71 points
Date : 2023-03-05 16:15 UTC (6 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (cuencahighlife.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (cuencahighlife.com)
| earlyam wrote:
| Some anecdata: I've seen a big increase in pro-Chinese commentors
| on the internet in the past year or so. HN especially. It keeps
| popping up in subtle ways. I'm not saying it's necessarily
| propaganda or psyops, but we'd be fools to believe China isn't
| doing that quite extensively. Hell, America does it; we just had
| a scandal where the military was doing that when they shouldn't
| have been.
| pessimizer wrote:
| > I've seen a big increase in pro-Chinese commentors on the
| internet in the past year or so.
|
| During the same period, I've noticed a huge increase in anti-
| Chinese sentiment and rhetoric, and an agreement among
| nationalists that China must be stopped, and that military
| conflict must be prepared for. An extreme escalation of Western
| chauvinism even after years of Uighur extermination stories.
| honkler wrote:
| Mostly MAGA muricans who vent their frustration out against
| china, when in reality it's their "greatest ally" in Middle
| east that's taking them for a ride.
| ipv6ipv4 wrote:
| Q.E.D
| olddustytrail wrote:
| Well yes, you're going to see anti-chinese sentiments when
| they're engaged in Uighur extermination.
|
| What did you think would happen?
| thephyber wrote:
| This post isn't excusing Chinese actions towards Uighurs,
| but is heavily critical of anti-Chinese criticisms of their
| Uighur policy.
|
| Note that Uighurs are majority Muslim and they aren't all
| being exterminated (certainly some are), but the primary
| efforts seem to be making that region and ethnicity much
| more similar in culture to Han-Chinese. It rings of the
| "white genocide" and "Jews will not replace us" slogans.
|
| The Chinese government seems to use the 9/11 style "we are
| monitoring them so they don't become radical Islamic
| terrorists". The government efforts are to destroy practice
| of Islam, to restrict / deter the spread of Islam and
| criticisms of the government.
|
| Interestingly the most anti-Chinese people in the US are
| the ones with the biggest intersection with these policies
| and claim the US is doing the exact same thing to
| them.American Christians who claim they aren't able to
| practice their faith in the US, while simultaneously
| insisting that the US is a Christian nation, that Islam
| shouldn't be practiced in the US, that Islam creates
| terrorism, that civil liberties should be rolled back in
| the efforts to reduce terrorism, and insist that Islamic
| Sharia law is endemic in the US.
|
| American Anti-Chinese sentiment of the social type seems
| like a cry bully. There are some far more valid criticisms
| of the wider social controls and economic policy in China.
| corbulo wrote:
| >Note that Uighurs are majority Muslim and they aren't
| all being exterminated (certainly some are), but the
| primary efforts seem to be making that region and
| ethnicity much more similar in culture to Han-Chinese. It
| rings of the "white genocide" and "Jews will not replace
| us" slogans.
|
| This is quite the impressive paragraph. What are you even
| saying?
| corbulo wrote:
| Only in the last year?
|
| It is important to remember the near-global admiration for
| China's lockdowns during the first year of the pandemic. Highly
| manufactured. Twitter was a huge incubator for it.
| throwng wrote:
| [flagged]
| the_doctah wrote:
| Look no further than Hollywood which for some reason keeps
| blatantly peddling pro-Communism
| Oxidation wrote:
| Not nearly blatant enough if you ask me. I'm still waiting
| for the Tom Cruise sequel _Top Gun: Top Marx_.
| tedlistens wrote:
| you can find some of those videos (and others) embedded here:
| https://www.fastcompany.com/90853542/deepfakes-getting-smart...
| gwern wrote:
| Just plagiarizing
| https://www.nytimes.com/2023/02/07/technology/artificial-int...
| baal80spam wrote:
| Dystopia is around the corner. Fake news provided by fake people.
| What a time to be alive... right?
| steponlego wrote:
| Is this kind of like the incubator babies testimony before Iraq
| War I?
| nickpeterson wrote:
| Who goes to the trouble of generating realistic ai people then
| names the fake network _Wolf_?
| my_city wrote:
| "Chinese disinformation"
|
| NATO disinformation is the problem, because is used to justify
| and sell wars to the public. Remember when they told us that Iraq
| had Weapons of Mass Destruction, or now that COVID is a "chinese
| biological weapon"?
|
| Unlike NATO countries, China has never invaded or bombed any
| country based on lies. Its last war was more than 40 years ago.
| While NATO keeps starting wars in Syria, Lybia, Yemen,
| Yugoslavia, Serbia, Iraq, Afghanistan, etc.
| flufferstutter wrote:
| I'm sure that makes the Uighur sleep better at night.
| pessimizer wrote:
| Scary. Next they might hire two white people, put them in front
| of a green screen, and do the exact same thing. That will be
| really terrifying because they won't even need to use deepfakes.
|
| Have the Chinese discovered fiverr? They could generate hundreds
| of these a day.
| bboygravity wrote:
| You don't know that this has been going on for at least a
| decade (probably way longer)?
|
| The Chinese government hires Western influencers to spread
| their propaganda all the time. Those who are on Youtube and
| elsewhere.
|
| Getting paid for spreading that government propaganda (and for
| doing "normal" Chinese company ads) as a white person is
| referred to in China as going for "a white monkey job".
| [deleted]
| IvyMike wrote:
| The original report from Graphika (pdf): https://public-
| assets.graphika.com/reports/graphika-report-d...
|
| I didn't find the "Wolf News" segments, but other video using the
| same Synthesia avatars is available:
|
| The male avatar: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0cm7Vl2kvfA
|
| The female avatar: https://www.synthesia.io/features/avatars
| Proven wrote:
| [dead]
| TheBlight wrote:
| [flagged]
| fakeslimshady5 wrote:
| [dead]
| gaoshan wrote:
| This is a mish mash of your own sort of misinformation. You
| mention politically left leaning, left and center media outlets
| yet completely leave out right wing outlets that are inarguably
| (at least from any logical and fact based perspective) and
| objectively more likely to spread falsehoods.
|
| You then toss out a salad of conspiracy tinged topics but lump
| things like this laptop topic with "masks work". The laptop
| thing is completely buried in conspiracy nonsense but one thing
| is certain, the only evidence for anything amiss comes from
| people with a very narrowly focused political agenda and that
| should raise doubts in anyone reasonable. Then you mention
| masks, as if there is something actually controversial there.
| There isn't (not to normal people, anyway). Health care
| professionals wear them for a reason and that reason isn't
| anything nefarious or political. Only the opposition to it
| comes from such a place. Even "you won't get covid if you take
| these shots" is silly and disingenuous. No one credible ever
| claimed that. They are a vaccine and they work by providing a
| degree of immunity. That's the gist of it. Always has been.
| Again, only people with an extreme political agenda claim
| otherwise.
| TheBlight wrote:
| They're "conspiracy tinged" because the media claimed they
| were conspiracy theories but that all turned out to be a lie.
|
| Surgeons historically wear masks so they don't spit in open
| wounds.
|
| Plenty of credible people claimed if you took the shots you
| wouldn't get the virus. Unless you don't think the director
| of the CDC or President Biden are credible.
|
| I'm sorry if this is all upsetting to you.
| pessimizer wrote:
| > objectively more likely to spread falsehoods.
|
| According to who? The "conspiracy tinged topics" that you
| describe so fairly were some of the most over-covered
| stories, were substantially wrong, and were known at the time
| of being printed that they were substantially wrong.
|
| > Then you mention masks, as if there is something actually
| controversial there.
|
| There is. While masks were thought by scientists in authority
| to slow transmission, Fauci told everyone that masks were not
| only useless but harmful, and that people shouldn't be
| wearing them. He later admitted to lying about that. That may
| not be controversial to you, but if you can't imagine or
| empathize with people being upset that the government was
| lying to them in order to manipulate their behavior, you
| aren't very imaginative or empathetic.
|
| > There isn't (not to normal people, anyway)
|
| I think that when many people who agree with you see bad
| faith argument like this, they start re-evaluating their
| position.
| boeingUH60 wrote:
| This is something that is important to know of; propaganda is not
| necessarily delivering fake news. It can be foreign actors
| exploiting a country's problems, e.g., gun violence, racism,
| pandemic response, religious differences, etc., to sow division
| among the population. For example, Russian Facebook groups
| encouraged protests in Texas that riled Christians against
| supposed Islamization of the state and Muslims to counter-protest
| [1].
|
| As I once explained in a previous comment on another HN post --
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=33847117 -- I was involved
| in a political campaign that involved using fake profiles on
| Twitter and Facebook to boost news that favored the politician
| and attacked their opponents (I was a naive college kid then).
| The Twitter account still exists today.
|
| Mind you, this campaign was a small operation in a third world
| country with less than two dozen people. Imagine what governments
| with millions to billions of dollars at their disposal could do.
| America's opponents can obviously not invade it or place
| sanctions, so they'll try to attack it wherever they can, and you
| can be sure they are doing it.
|
| After my experience, I stopped paying attention or believing
| anything from social media. The majority of it are outright lies
| or half-truths, and I have not the time or strength to sift
| through them...not to talk of social media being outrage farming
| for the purpose of securing ad dollars.
|
| 1- https://www.npr.org/2017/11/01/561427876/how-russia-used-
| fac...
| worksonmine wrote:
| > It can be foreign actors exploiting a country's problems,
| e.g., gun violence, racism, pandemic response, religious
| differences, etc., to sow division among the population.
|
| Doesn't even have to be foreign. I think most of the propaganda
| the majority is exposed to comes from our own media and the
| politicians they cover. When they tell us not to trust X and Y
| that's just them being scared of losing the narrative.
|
| The US is the most extreme in a western context (don't know
| much about the east I don't speak their language), the level of
| polarization in their media is mind-blowing. From the outside
| it's fucked up to read, and even worse to see normal people
| acting like this is somehow the other sides' fault.
|
| People need an enemy today, and it can't be those in charge
| they're making sure of that.
| t344344 wrote:
| Do not forget the 2016 election! Russia is the main reason why
| Trump won!
| worksonmine wrote:
| This reads like satire, but looking through your comments
| make me believe you're sincere. This here is a great example
| of when propaganda gets its own life and spreads by itself.
| Like malware but infecting humans.
|
| Snowden was a russian spy too right? Let's forget the US was
| breaking its own laws because Russia. So simple.
| t344344 wrote:
| Also do not forget 2020 elections! Russia planted laptop
| with fake data!
| nhchris wrote:
| > It can be foreign actors
|
| They don't have to be foreign. And tangentially, good
| propaganda is not recognized as such. For a borderline example,
| see how Call of Duty changed the attackers in the highway of
| death from the US to Russia [1]. But since it's only "inspired"
| by real events, they can claim they didn't falsify history, all
| the while contributing to a false perception of US forces.
|
| Non-borderline cases are even subtler and more insidious, often
| indistinguishable from artistic intent, and can be anything
| from casting choices to subject matter (ever notice how some
| historical events get more attention than others?). Less overt,
| less coherent, but when so much media comes from California or
| New York, it makes their attitudes the default everywhere where
| that media dominates.
|
| Imagine if the default, ambient culture, was shaped by Mumbai
| as much as it is today by Hollywood/New York. Yet even with
| your experience with propaganda, it slips under your radar.
| _That 's_ power.
|
| [1] https://www.vice.com/en/article/mbmwgn/modern-warfare-the-
| hi...
| itsoktocry wrote:
| I find it funny to blame the "Russian organizers" as opposed to
| the thousands of American people who are members of the groups
| and showed up on the street to protest and fight. Do you think
| they were brainwashed for $200 in Facebook ad spend?
| okamiueru wrote:
| People en mass will always have the gullible. It's either
| "allowing a system that amplifies such misinformation", or
| "the actors exploiting it", that deserve blame.
|
| Why would you care to blame the gullible who don't know any
| better?
| worksonmine wrote:
| I think you're not giving them credit when claiming they're
| all gullible. Who says your point of view is the correct
| one? If we take the analogy to the pandemic with social
| media putting the stamp of approval on posts confirming
| their narrative, while flagging official .gov links.
|
| Then the so called gullible are simply normal people asking
| for open discussion. And some people on their high horses
| claim they're brainwashed, gullible, russian agents or
| bots. Now a lot of that so called misinformation is showing
| to be true, even the far-fetched lab leak with gain-of-
| function research funded by a US agency, in fucking China.
|
| What's even real anymore. The most important thing humanity
| can do today is putting higher standards of truth on
| themselves and their allies instead of knee-jerk reactions
| and calling the opposite side gullible. They have their
| arguments if we take a breath and listen. And there's a
| good chance you're just as brainwashed as those you oppose.
| 2OEH8eoCRo0 wrote:
| I think that people around here get antsy when this topic
| is raised because mis/disinformation is a cousin of
| advertising- the cash cow of silicon valley VC power-elite.
| The conversation often goes to combating these things which
| could turn into privacy/information regulation which would
| hurt their paychecks. So they clam up and blame the
| gullible. Just a thought.
| boeingUH60 wrote:
| People will always have social groups that can be exploited
| to sow discord. Like I said, my personal solution was to stop
| paying attention to social media altogether, but that
| obviously won't happen for everyone.
|
| While you blame the "brainwashed", I blame the executives and
| workers at the likes of Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, Reddit,
| et al. They know their platform is being exploited to rile up
| anger but it brings them the sweet ad dollars so they don't
| care. They can even feel better and feign some self-
| righteousness by blaming the "brainwashed" instead of the
| platforms they oversee...very difficult to get them to admit
| to the problem when their financial interest depends on it.
| 2OEH8eoCRo0 wrote:
| > my personal solution was to stop paying attention to
| social media altogether
|
| Agreed. I deleted all my social media accounts except for
| this one and it helped immensely. I sometimes feel like I
| live in a different world.
| bsder wrote:
| Why are they using AI instead of real talking heads? Something
| doesn't add up ...
___________________________________________________________________
(page generated 2023-03-05 23:01 UTC)