Tuesday, June 20, 2023

A Rabbit Hole Example





A lot of content here is posted with some hesitancy as the forces of disinformation are constantly looking for that big new idea to exploit.  The disinfo researches don’t want to fan the flames too much.  Something that qualifies as a big idea would be posting a lengthy article detailing how you used ChatGPT to write an article on particle physics that blew your high school teacher’s mind.  Maybe, since the AI thing is still fresh, that’s not the greatest idea.

But, since social media is tech based, and there’s a continued refusal to accept that content moderated by inept algorithms isn’t the best idea, there are some things that are old news, aren’t going away and will never go away.

There are some Twitter accounts that simply exist to be wrong about everything just for engagement.  I’ve created a fictitious example, including how disinformation researchers try to limit the damage.  We’re going to start with an image of a dog.  I imagine based on the original caption it’s a real pooch.  It has a distinctive look that is pretty eye catching.

My best guess is that this is some sort of pit bull/Dalmatian mix.  And actually, for all I know this is a fake image, photoshopped to achieve that look.  Ultimately, it doesn’t matter.  Accounts that are looking to be wrong about everything for engagement, have a wide variety of uses for a seemingly innocuous image like this. And they can and will throw out mutually exclusive stories that aren’t compatible just to see what gets some hits.  Examples:

This is a baby hyena

Pro Abortion doctor’s pit bull mauls protesters 

Westminster show crowns new breed as winner

Alien DNA found in Florida dog

Lost service dog:  owner needs help recovering

This is a DALPIT, which equals xxxx in Gematria 

—————————————————————-

With intent, a wide variety from the ludicrous to the somewhat lucid, to check what gets the most engagement.  Then, dropping the least successful stories and focusing on the one that gets the best ratings.  Especially if the ludicrous ones get the best ratings —> the narrative is being driven by cognitively damaged people that think this is really an alien DNA creature.

Also, with intent for engagement the more lucid content is out there, to give the more intellectually inclined a chance to waste time on the counter narrative, as well as the true story about what is actually going on with the dog.

So now, imagine the disinfo researchers are tired of hearing about this bullshit story of alien dog DNA and they find the real story.  Short term, they put the ❌ over the photo to not add fuel to the false narrative.  Such is the world we live in now.

There’s always a significant lag time between social media doing something about fake stories.  (My experience is/has been that Facebook is the worst.). What’s the harm with a silly and stupid story about an obviously fake thing that nobody would actually believe? Well spam bots and grifter accounts can fake a lot of I believe in this activity.  And people are now poking around more dangerous accounts like this one:

This has all the red flags of an account that deserves to be reported.  And the disinfo researcher talking about it trying to get it used now has to heavily redact the content to avoid further damage.

In our fictitious example here, arguing over this dog has generated traffic that purposefully funnels them into the darker content of the internet.  I don’t know exactly what the purpose of that account is, but it’s obviously up to no good.

1). Name is something nobody would pick plus bunch of numbers - a sign that it’s probably a member of a network of bots.

2). Appears to be encouraging stealing money from a list of cryptocurrency wallets.  Including a specific username and password.

3). Created just last month

4). 0 followers, 0 following

5). Randomly retweeting and liking a wide variety of old content that doesn’t have a common theme like a normal person would.  We’re talking even an old tweet from 2020, old.

Do you really want your kids poking around the financial version of revenge porn?  Or hacking and stealing?  Or being funneled to a URL looking to phish for your personal info?  Do you really want the hassle of a monthly fee for a VPN just because you’re too proud to admit that maybe some small effort into understanding and training people on how grifting on the internet works?  Today’s teenager that is willing to believe in alien dog DNA is far more likely to get funneled into the world of, “Hey, I don’t have to pay my traffic ticket, because the King of Scottsdale Arizona said they’re an illegitimate government because they have FUCKING GOOD FRINGE ON THEIR COURTROOM FLAGS!!”

Avoid the lag time.  If something sounds too good to be true, it probably is.  If something sounds too stupid to be true, it probably is.  And it also could have an ulterior motive.

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