Politics

Twitter Files reportedly show Twitter spread Pentagon ‘propaganda’ in the Middle East

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Twitter reportedly allowed the Pentagon to use the platform to carry out a covert online propaganda and influence campaign for at least five years, according to the latest release of “Twitter Files” published on Tuesday.

According to internal company documents shared by reporter Lee Fang of The Intercept, Twitter followed a request by the Defense Department in verifying and “whitelisting” accounts affiliated with US Central Command in an attempt to change public opinion in middle eastern countries including Yemen, Syria, Iraq, and Kuwait.

The government-run accounts frequently shared news clips and memes in the Arabic language. While the accounts were originally open about their affiliation with the US government, they later concealed this fact.

This goes against comments made by Twitter executives, who have previously claimed that they don’t allow governments to use the platform to spread propaganda.

Despite these claims, Twitter allowed the accounts to spread their messages freely and without restrictions.

According to Lee Fang, the first known reference to the propaganda campaign appears in a July 2017 email from Nathaniel Kahler, a CENTCOM official, who was requesting approval for the verification of one of their accounts and the whitelisting of 52 Arab-language accounts that the official said were used to “amplify certain messages.”

“We’ve got some accounts that are not indexing on hashtags — perhaps they were flagged as bots,” the CENTCOM official wrote. “A few of these had built a real following and we hope to salvage.”

ARTICLE: PAUL MURDOCH

MANAGING EDITOR: CARSON CHOATE

PHOTO CREDITS: WASHINGTON EXAMINER

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Paul Murdoch

Paul, 37, is from Scotland in the UK, but currently lives and works in Bangkok. Paul has worked in different industries such as telemarketing, retail, hospitality, farming, insurance, and teaching, where he works now. He teaches at an all-girls High School in Bangkok. “It’s a lot of work, but I love my job.” Paul has an active interest in politics. His reason for writing for FBA is to offer people the facts and allow them to make up their own minds. Whilst he believes opinion columns have their place, it is also important that people can have accurate news with no bias.

Paul, 37, is from Scotland in the UK, but currently lives and works in Bangkok. Paul has worked in different industries such as telemarketing, retail, hospitality, farming, insurance, and teaching, where he works now. He teaches at an all-girls High School in Bangkok. “It’s a lot of work, but I love my job.” Paul has an active interest in politics. His reason for writing for FBA is to offer people the facts and allow them to make up their own minds. Whilst he believes opinion columns have their place, it is also important that people can have accurate news with no bias.

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