Meta shuts down Israeli network pushing AI-generated propaganda in U.S.

[sebzim4500]

>The Israeli network included 510 Facebook accounts, 11 pages, one group, and 32 Instagram accounts. Meta said that it took the network down early in its audience-building efforts, before it was able to generate activity among authentic communities. The network had fewer than 500 followers on Facebook, fewer than 100 group members, and about 2,000 Instagram followers

I don't use facebook, but is this really significant compared to the enormous number of bots that I assume exist? Certainly banning 500 bots on youtube or twitter would not be noticable.

[mbesto]

This is the problem with reporting these numbers. Virality works like a pyramid, the effect is felt throughout the whole pyramid, but only takes the top of it to set it into action.

10,000 facebook accounts with 100 followers who then have 1000 followers is very different than 500 facebook accounts with 100,000 followers who then have 10M followers.

[jvanderbot]

Didn't your quote precisely say that it wasn't very large yet? I think thats the point - to get it early.

[suoduandao3]

I don't think it's the number of bots as much as who they belonged to that's being reported on. Russian activity on facebook prior to the 2016 presidential election was similarly modest.

[akira2501]

> Certainly banning 500 bots on youtube or twitter would not be noticable.

If they were 500 independent bots, sure. If they're 500 bots that are coordinated, then I wouldn't be so sure, because the logic cuts the other way.

"Certainly spending money and political capital to run just 500 bots on youtube wouldn't move the needle and would create much useless risk."

[082349872349872]

Like the stash of midget donkey necro porn, at some point there are going to be botnets which exist in order to be caught, thus drawing attention away from the better hidden botnets — compare Obi Wan distracting Vader while R2 escapes...

(did the Allies ever leak a story that Normandy would be the target of the D-day landings, but so crudely done that it was "obviously" a plant?)

[colechristensen]

Facebook is absolutely filled with garbage. About 1% of the people I ever connected with are still active, and half of them are obnoxious users. (and the other half are delightful, why yes I do indeed want to see the vintage cookie press that made cookies from the ancestral home country that my mothers cousin found at an estate sale)

The rest of facebook for me are a couple of closed groups that are a decent community and then just tons and tons of garbage. Uncomfortable sexualization in several categories that one has to work to get FB to stop showing you, rage bait petty fake stories reposted from "Ask Abby" or /r/aita, and AI generated bait of all types like fake (movie posters | news items | celeb nonsense).

I'm pretty sure there just isn't any content left getting posted on facebook.

[artninja1988]

There seems to be a lot of these bots on twitter. I hate starting to read a post only to realize it's a bot trying to push scams/ whatever I've just wasted my time on. At times like these I almost wish for some kind of digital ID to have a verification of interacting with a human. Don't know if that's possible in a robust and truly privacy preserving way

[sandworm101]

>> some kind of digital ID to have a verification of interacting with a human.

So a reverse captcha? Maybe we could append the results of a captcha to a post. Here is my theory about democracy, and here is proof that I can correctly spot bicycles.

[sebzim4500]

I don't think that's necessary.

A regex could catch a huge number of bots on twitter, but if they banned them they would have to admit that usage has gone down.

[Teever]

Can anyone speculate on why this post was flagged?

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40509030

[invalidname]

Because it only discusses the Israeli network shut down and not the Iranian one that they also shut down.

[exolymph]

It's political, a lot of users don't like divisive topics being featured on HN.

[WalterSear]

I don't need to.

[ChrisArchitect]

Link to report here:

https://transparency.meta.com/metasecurity/threat-reporting#...

[aerodog]

Zuckerberg is a Zionist and FB / IG are there to help the Zionist agenda, not to work against it.

[aaomidi]

Flagged in 3..2..

[brink]

A lot of highly divisive political articles coming up on the front page today before getting flagged.

[lupusreal]

That was an easy call to be fair.

[seanvelasco]

Now do the same for Iran-backed campaigns. And China's.

[ceejayoz]

Both happen regularly.

Iran: https://www.reuters.com/technology/meta-removes-iran-based-f...

China (and Russia): https://www.npr.org/2023/08/29/1196117574/meta-says-chinese-...

[starik36]

The article states that an Iranian network targeting Israelis was also shut down. It also states that the Iranian network "had a broader influence than the Israeli network".

Why did the site decide to go with the title only mentioning Israeli network, given that the Iranian network was bigger... hmmm.

[jmclnx]

>Meta has removed a network of hundreds of Facebook and Instagram accounts that operated from Israel and launched an influence campaign targeting users in the U.S. and Canada

I do not use Facebook, and I think this is a good thing. But what about Hamas ? I am sure Hamas also has their own bot network(s) targeting people in the US, or was that already done but there was no press about that ?

[ajkjk]

Why are you sure..? They have many fewer resources at their disposal.

[limpbizkitfan]

Hamas is probably too busy defending their homeland against the collective “technological might” of the West’s military industrial complex.

[beardyw]

Whataboutism

"The communication intent is often to distract from the content of a topic"

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Whataboutism#:~:text=Whatabo...